Mavic air 2 lost signal above water and fog

[Deleted member 155248]

It's not smartassery to give factual advice.
Particularly when you don't seem to have a good understanding of what's involved.
As long as you have a clear unobstructed view of the sky, it's not at all normal to lose GPS signal when in a remote area at all.
The wilds of Alaska are no more remote than anywhere else since the satellites are 12000 miles away, orbiting the earth.

Gps does drop even if uncovered, it is rare but it does drop. However that is not the topic.
You could've ask nicely how did i know i was within 1/4 mile range, but instead you you accused the operator...world is already full of "know it all fools" don't be one of them. Ask nicely for missing information and you'll get them. I attached screenshot and explained how I knew i was very close to being back where i took of from.

 

[Meta4]

Gps does drop even if uncovered, it is rare but it does drop. However that is not the topic.
You could've ask nicely how did i know i was within 1/4 mile range, but instead you you accused the operator...world is already full of "know it all fools" don't be one of them. Ask nicely for missing information and you'll get them. I attached screenshot and explained how I knew i was very close to being back where i took of from.

It's so nice to try to try help someone who is so snarky.
Here's some more smartassery for you.
Looking into your flight data, I see that your drone started autolanding after losing signal (with no GPS), soon after 14:28.2.
But your control signal was re-established at 14:51.6, showing the drone in autolanding and approx 70 ft higher than the launch point.
You didn't try to cancel the autolanding and resume control?
Maybe try that with your next drone.

 

[Deleted member 155248]

It's not smartassery to give factual advice.
Particularly when you don't seem to have a good understanding of what's involved.
As long as you have a clear unobstructed view of the sky, it's not at all normal to lose GPS signal when in a remote area at all.
The wilds of Alaska are no more remote than anywhere else since the satellites are 12000 miles away, orbiting the earth.

Gps does drop even if uncovered, it is rare but it does drop. However that is not the topic.
You could've ask nicely how did i know i was within 1/4 mile range, but instead you you accused the operator...world is already full of "know it all fools" don't be one of them. Ask nicely for missing information and you'll get them. I attached screenshot and explained how I knew i was very close to being back where i

It's so nice to try to try help someone who is so snarky.
Here's some more smartassery for you.
Looking into your flight data, I see that your drone started autolanding after losing signal (with no GPS), soon after 14:28.2.
But your control signal was re-established at 14:51.6, showing the drone in autolanding and approx 70 ft higher than the launch point.
You didn't try to cancel the autolanding and resume control?
Maybe try that with your next drone.

at the moment it lost signal it was still at 40% battery, for next 20 seconds signal kept going in and out and for some reason it kept wanting to land automatically, i kept pushing cancel(X) button and not sure if it worked because signal never came back after 20ish seconds. I kept holding forward stick even after lost signal hoping it would make it to land instead of water.
RTH wouldn't work because it didn't have gps signal...

Dude you've god a problem within yourself. You are not trying to help, if you were, you would ask for missing information nicely instead of accusing the operator and making a judgements of what someone did wrong...
Read my original post, i quoted a piece I want you to see, it's in bold letters.
I also took of from the hill that was 50+feet higher elevation then the water below i was flying over.

 

[Meta4]

Dude you've god a problem within yourself. You are not trying to help, if you were, you would ask for missing information nicely instead of accusing the operator and making a judgements of what someone did wrong...

No you are just irritating me.
You lost your drone, you asked for help.
I work with the information you (and the data) give.
If you leave important things out, that's on you.

Read my original post, i quoted a piece I want you to see, it's in bold letters.
I also took of from the hill that was 50+feet higher elevation then the water below i was flying over.

I read everything you've posted.
That's what I do when I'm helping with flight incident analysis.
I also looked closely at the flight data which shows you leaving the drone to continue the autodescent for 31.8 seconds until signal was lost again.

Your first post says that you kept pushing cancel(X) button, while signal was lost but says nothing about what you did after signal was restored at 14:51.6.

By pushing the cancel button, you were attempting to cancel RTH.
When you had signal again, you should have cancelled the Autoland (that's not RTH) and resumed control.
You could have done that by flicking the controller out of Normal Mode and back again.
If you'd had that knowledge, you might still have your drone.

 

[Deleted member 155248]

No you are just irritating me.
You lost your drone, you asked for help.
I work with the information you (and the data) give.
If you leave important things out, that's on you.

I read everything you've posted.
That's what I do when I'm helping with flight incident analysis.
I also looked closely at the flight data which shows you leaving the drone to continue the autodescent for 31.8 seconds until signal was lost again.

Your first post says that you kept pushing cancel(X) button, while signal was lost but says nothing about what you did after signal was restored at 14:51.6.

By pushing the cancel button, you were attempting to cancel RTH.
When you had signal again, you should have cancelled the Autoland (that's not RTH) and resumed control.
You could have done that by flicking the controller out of Normal Mode and back again.
If you'd had that knowledge, you might still have your drone.

I didn't leave important information out, i sad i was within 1/4 mile(i didn't attach proof screenshot at the beginning) but you're the one that judged that i had no idea where drone was while i did because I had video stream.

I never started RTH, the X i was pushing was for auto landing, as it stated on the screen AUTO LANDING with RED (X) next to it.
That's when I was pushing X when signal intermittently came back, but don't think that worked as shortly after signal was lost permanently.

I can careless about the drone itself, it was insured and I'm getting a new one, even if not i could buy new one anytime, I'm not broke. I am just trying to understand why would signal get lost randomly because luckily i was in the area with no people around to hurt anyone, that's my only concern with losing signal in future in different places. Which looking back at everything and how i did not have gps for past couple flights in Alaska, it's making me realize that drone hardware might've been faulty in other ways and not just gps.

 

[AZDave]

Any chance there might have been a larger boat in the bay that has sonar or GPS navigation equipment running. This could cause problems with your connection. I have seen this on a couple of Autel drones in the past.

Sonar uses sound. GPS is passive (receive only ... doesn't transmit).

Radar transmits, of course, but on a much higher frequency than used by drones. And if radar was an issue the military wouldn't be so worried about drone swarm attacks.

 

[slup]

Can't properly judge if you could have been standing in dense fog from the attached pic in post #19 ... but,

Moisture such as fog, rain & snow (depending on its water content) adds attenuation to the signal's path. Also, the amount of attenuation it can cause depends on the frequency being used. The lower the frequency the less attenuation. The higher the frequency the higher the attenuation.

Might have played a role together with other factors ... such as not fully pointing the RC in the correct direction.

 

[AZDave]

Can't properly judge if you could have been standing in dense fog from the attached pic in post #19 ... but,

Moisture such as fog, rain & snow (depending on its water content) adds attenuation to the signal's path. Also, the amount of attenuation it can cause depends on the frequency being used. The lower the frequency the less attenuation. The higher the frequency the higher the attenuation.

Might have played a role together with other factors ... such as not fully pointing the RC in the correct direction.

That is all true.

Moisture (fog) also has a dielectric constant different than air (water has a dielectric constant of about 3 ... air is about 1), so even without attenuation deflection of the RF can occur at the boundary between the fog and the air. I'm not saying that happened here, but it is a possible influence. A similar effect called ducting occurs during heavy weather even at VHF and UHF frequencies, although over a much longer distance due to the longer wavelengths.

 

[JAW]

Your statement luckily i was in the area with no people around to hurt anyone, that's my only concern becomes irrelevant once you fly BVLOS. Most all have done it, myself included, and the risk taken is not the uncontrolled descent of an unseen drone and where it might come to earth, but rather the consequences of dangerous (some might say irresponsible) operation.