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Mavic air submarined in Hawaii but recovered! Malfunction?

Rtsousley

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Joined
Feb 10, 2019
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Hello all, new to this forum. Had an interesting experience this week. Had some stunning footage filmed while on vacation in Hawaii this last week. Magic was performing flawlessly, witnessed a guy put his GoPro drone in the ocean when it lost signal and auto landed in place! Poor guy I thought, and then... I was flying about 300ft in altitude, over the town in La' ie, Hawaii, I started to experience some video interference so I directed the mavic out over water and on a course back toward me in a sweeping right turn, video seemed to improve and then lost signal to RC, next thing I heard was "landing!". I started to run down the beach and re-establish connection somehow. As I am running I power off the rc, and power it back on, it successfully reconnected, and I see a message of "unsuitable landing zone" or something to that effect, I quickly click into sport mode and climb, then gather my bearings and bring it over to me. It was wet, but functioning properly. I raced it back and forth down the beach to dry it out a bit, then shut it down, and removed battery. At this point I thought it just got some spray from a close call. No battery issues, no flight issues, then noticed the gimble was tilted to the left a little funky. I bought a bottle of 96% isopropyl alcohol and flushed the drone, and into the rice it went for a couple days. In the meantime I check out the video. It indeed attempted to land, then stopped and hovered above the water as small waves go by underneath, and then it happened, two waves wash over the top of it, and I am catching video underwater, but it must have only submerged 75%or so, because flight was unaffected. Incredible video! Today I turn it back on for the first time. Haven't flown it yet, but it connects, camera operates, no error messages, however gimble doesn't work. Big question, why didn't rth kick in, I verified the setting were set to rth upon signal loss right after the other guy lost his... I am going to attention to post flight logs, never done anything with them before.
 

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Hello all, new to this forum. Had an interesting experience this week. Had some stunning footage filmed while on vacation in Hawaii this last week. Magic was performing flawlessly, witnessed a guy out his GoPro drone in the ocean when it lost signal and auto landed in place! Poor guy I thought, and then... I was flying about 300ft in altitude, over the town in La' ur, Hawaii, I started to experience some video interference so I directed the magic out over water and on a course back toward me in a sweeping right turn, video seemed to improve and then lost signal to RC, next thing I heard was "landing!". I started to run down the beach and re-establish connection somehow. As I am running I power off the exit, and power it back on, it successfully reconnected, and I see a message of "unsuitable landing zone" or something to that effect, I quickly click into sport mode and climb, then gather my bearings and bring it over to me. It was wet, but functioning properly. I raced it back and forth down the beach to dry it out a bit, then shut it down, and removed battery. At this point I thought it just got some spray from a close call. No battery issues, no flight issues, then noticed the gimble was tilted to the left a little funky. I bought a bottle of 96% isopropyl alcohol and flushed the drone, and into the rice it went for a couple days. In the meantime I check out the video. It indeed attempted to land, then stopped and hovered above the water as small waves go by underneath, and then it happened, two waves wash over the top of it, and I am catching video underwater, but it must have only submerged 75%or so, because flight was unaffected. Incredible video! Today I turn it back on for the first time. Haven't flown it yet, but it connects, camera operates, no error messages, however gimble doesn't work. Big question, why didn't rth kick in, I verified the setting were set to rth upon signal loss right after the other guy lost his... I am going to attention to post flight logs, never done anything with them before.
Sorry for you’re Mavic but if it hits salt water your Drone is lost
 
I will get the drone replaced, not too worried about that, I kind of expected something would happen eventually, but hoped it wouldnt. Big worry is why didn't it rth? I hope to prevent this again in the future. Just for fun, here's the video snippet...


 
The salt will eat the board and cause shorts circuits next time take out the batt. And put it in a bucket of fresh water to rinse out the salt but mostly it a goner

Not always. I have recovered many many from salt water crashes and they lived to tell the tale. It's amazing how electronics can be salvaged these days.
 
Not always. I have recovered many many from salt water crashes and they lived to tell the tale. It's amazing how electronics can be salvaged these days.
Lost my hero550 drone in the ocean everything dead including GoPro did take me some time to get it out the water
 
Dude I am really sorry for your troubles, but what a freaking awesome video! These drones are almost indestructible lol.

Thanks for sharing and nice one and saving your bird the way you did, that was a great story in terms of action and drama with a happy ending lmao
 
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Hello all, new to this forum. Had an interesting experience this week. Had some stunning footage filmed while on vacation in Hawaii this last week. Magic was performing flawlessly, witnessed a guy out his GoPro drone in the ocean when it lost signal and auto landed in place! Poor guy I thought, and then... I was flying about 300ft in altitude, over the town in La' ur, Hawaii, I started to experience some video interference so I directed the magic out over water and on a course back toward me in a sweeping right turn, video seemed to improve and then lost signal to RC, next thing I heard was "landing!". I started to run down the beach and re-establish connection somehow. As I am running I power off the exit, and power it back on, it successfully reconnected, and I see a message of "unsuitable landing zone" or something to that effect, I quickly click into sport mode and climb, then gather my bearings and bring it over to me. It was wet, but functioning properly. I raced it back and forth down the beach to dry it out a bit, then shut it down, and removed battery. At this point I thought it just got some spray from a close call. No battery issues, no flight issues, then noticed the gimble was tilted to the left a little funky. I bought a bottle of 96% isopropyl alcohol and flushed the drone, and into the rice it went for a couple days. In the meantime I check out the video. It indeed attempted to land, then stopped and hovered above the water as small waves go by underneath, and then it happened, two waves wash over the top of it, and I am catching video underwater, but it must have only submerged 75%or so, because flight was unaffected. Incredible video! Today I turn it back on for the first time. Haven't flown it yet, but it connects, camera operates, no error messages, however gimble doesn't work. Big question, why didn't rth kick in, I verified the setting were set to rth upon signal loss right after the other guy lost his... I am going to attention to post flight logs, never done anything with them before.

You had it so that when your drone lost connection it auto landed.
 

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