Low Battery and Low Trees are not a good combination!

[Dave in South Africa]

Just a friendly warning from South Africa, where I foolishly crashed into an overhanging tree with my Mavic Air through carelessly running the battery to almost zero.

Over the weekend I'd been flying up and down our beautiful coastline taking great sea pictures, and using up most of my battery time. I was on my third of three batteries, and decided to walk home just behind the low hovering drone, as there were a number of trees above me that would have made a high flying experience impossible.

I heard (and ignored) the low battery warning, and continued to follow the drone as it flew in front of me about 1 meter off the ground. And then, it happened! The automatic Return to Home function kicked in, and my precious Mavic Air flew straight up into the trees, seeking its minimum RTH altitude of 30 meters. It then crashed into the ground.

Fortunately, after changing what could have been badly damaged propeller blades and polishing out most of the scratches, all seems to be well. I'm up and flying again, but a little more cautious of over stretching the battery in the future.

 

[Travisimo]

If you’re going to do something like that, just change the RTH function to Hover. Just make sure you change it back next time you fly (part of a pre-flight checklist). Glad nothing was broken!

 

[msinger]

I heard (and ignored) the low battery warning, and continued to follow the drone as it flew in front of me about 1 meter off the ground. And then, it happened! The automatic Return to Home function kicked in, and my precious Mavic Air flew straight up into the trees, seeking its minimum RTH altitude of 30 meters. It then crashed into the ground.

You can prevent that from happening again by disabling the "Smart Return-to-Home" setting in the following section of DJI GO:

If you’re going to do something like that, just change the RTH function to Hover.

That setting only changes what happens if the remote controller signal is lost. While it would not have prevented the above scenario, it's a great suggestion when flying below obstacles.

FYI, here's where that setting is located in DJI GO: