Mavic Mini lost...devastated. Please help.

[AerialTom]

Today I lost my mavic mini, only a week since buying it. What did I do wrong?

I was in the process of manually flying the drone back towards the home point then suddenly all connection was cut off. I waited to see if I could re-establish contact with the drone but nothing happened.


What likely happened to the drone?

Was I flying too high?

Why wasn’t I able to re-establish connection? I lost connection once but was able to reconnect. At this point I decided to turn back.

On my way back I had strong GPS coverage and wifi signal, as shown in the video.

Below is a youtube video of the flight data.


Mavic Mini Flight Data

Many thanks.

 

[old man mavic]

welcome to the forum sorry its not in happier circumstances

 

[old man mavic]

looking at your video you were far to high up to start with dont know your location but in this country its 120m maximum height
your drone just couldn't cope with the wind at the height you were at and simply blew away

 

[AerialTom]

Hi, appreciate your reply. Yes, I was flying far too high. Although the drone was 400m in the air, I was still able to control it - as shown in the video it was moving at about 5m/s and moving towards me. I just don’t understand how I lost connection altogether.

 

[sar104]

You will need to post the flight log if you want an answer.

 

[old man mavic]

well you were 1200ft high and 2361ft a from the home point if you draw a line on a graph you will find you were actually much further away from the RC than that, and you simply lost connection and the drone was unable to get back

 

[m80116]

1st let me just point out that I loathe when I see people flying above 100 meters and ignoring Strong Wind Warnings.

Then... if you had drone disconnect w/out reason I'll let you know this: I've lost my drone for this reason, I am still having the SAME problem, most probably Remote related with my second.

DJI is still investigating my logs (RC+MD+AC+DAT+MD video+Drone video) but still waiting for an answer. Sometimes it does disconnect and the only way to re-gain app control is to detach the USB OTG cable at one end and plug it back in.

 

[AerialTom]

When the drone loses connection with the RC, will it hover in the one spot, automatically begin to land or automatically return to home? Of course 400m up in the air it is likely to drift away in the wind.

 

[old man mavic]

When the drone loses connection with the RC, will it hover in the one spot, automatically begin to land or automatically return to home? Of course 400m up in the air it is likely to drift away in the wind.

it would try to do a RTH ,but it couldn't and by that time the battery was getting low, then eventually it would just land ,if you post your logs as Sar suggested then he might be able to give you a point to start your search from

 

[Starz]

When the drone loses connection with the RC, will it hover in the one spot, automatically begin to land or automatically return to home? Of course 400m up in the air it is likely to drift away in the wind.

That information is in the manual. May be worth reading.

 

[Meta4]

When the drone loses connection with the RC, will it hover in the one spot, automatically begin to land or automatically return to home? Of course 400m up in the air it is likely to drift away in the wind.

If you want to find out anything definite about the loss of your drone, you really need to post the recorded flight data.
Go to DJI Flight Log Viewer | Phantom Help
Follow the instructions there to upload your flight record from your phone or tablet.
That will give you a detailed report of the flight.
Come back and post a link to the report it gives you.

 

[ViktorSmooth]

It’s a tough lesson to learn. Would have been one of those news stories about a drone drifting at those altitudes.
Heed the warnings about winds. In my area the buzzards give me a good indication of high winds aloft.
Sorry for your loss.

 

[AerialTom]

You will need to post the flight log if you want an answer.

DJI Flight Log Viewer | Phantom Help

Upload and view flight logs from your DJI drones

www.phantomhelp.com

Here is the flight log.

 

[AerialTom]

Yeah, now I know the Mini’s limits. I will know better for next time.

 

[sar104]

DJI Flight Log Viewer | Phantom Help

Upload and view flight logs from your DJI drones

www.phantomhelp.com

Here is the flight log.

You mentioned that you lost connection before turning back: " I lost connection once but was able to reconnect. At this point I decided to turn back." There is no indication of any lost connection until the log stops. Can you elaborate on what you think happened there?

The downlink was completely solid until the disconnect, and you had clear line of sight to the aircraft. To me that suggests one of two things - either catastrophic sudden failure on the aircraft or the app disconnected from the RC. Can you check to see if the DAT file ending FLY047.DAT is still on your mobile device?

 

[DanMan32]

1st let me just point out that I loathe when I see people flying above 100 meters and ignoring Strong Wind Warnings.

Then... if you had drone disconnect w/out reason I'll let you know this: I've lost my drone for this reason, I am still having the SAME problem, most probably Remote related with my second.

DJI is still investigating my logs (RC+MD+AC+DAT+MD video+Drone video) but still waiting for an answer. Sometimes it does disconnect and the only way to re-gain app control is to detach the USB OTG cable at one end and plug it back in.

What's wrong with 120 meters, assuming winds aren't too strong that high?

 

[new2mavic]

Despite the warning message, the wind was not that strong. The downlink just suddenly disappeared when everything looks perfectly OK, looks like the drone just powered off in the air or some major failure has occurred on the RC side.

It's does not look like your fault so I believe it should be covered by warranty. Make sure that all flight logs in the phone are saved. There is no need to be devastated. Think about it positively - You are going to get a free new drone from DJI.

 

[AerialTom]

You mentioned that you lost connection before turning back: " I lost connection once but was able to reconnect. At this point I decided to turn back." There is no indication of any lost connection until the log stops. Can you elaborate on what you think happened there?

The downlink was completely solid until the disconnect, and you had clear line of sight to the aircraft. To me that suggests one of two things - either catastrophic sudden failure on the aircraft or the app disconnected from the RC. Can you check to see if the DAT file ending FLY047.DAT is still on your mobile device?

Thanks for your reply. The first time I lost connection during the flight I just assumed the drone was too far away. The warning message popped up on my screen - after 1 or 2 seconds of this occurring the connection went back to normal. I started to turn back then got the message again. This was the final message on my device, all contact with the drone was lost.

How can you check to see if that file is on my device? I went into the files of my phone then into the DJI Fly app docs. I didn’t see the file in the flight records folder, is it located somewhere else?

 

[AerialTom]

Despite the warning message, the wind was not that strong. The downlink just suddenly disappeared when everything looks perfectly OK, looks like the drone just powered off in the air or some major failure has occurred on the RC side.

It's does not look like your fault so I believe it should be covered by warranty. Make sure that all flight logs in the phone are saved. There is no need to be devastated. Think about it positively - You are going to get a free new drone from DJI.

Hopefully something can be sorted. If not, it wont be the end of the world. It could have been one of the Mavic Pro models, I’d be a broken man. Lol.

 

[slup]

Despite the warning message, the wind was not that strong. The downlink just suddenly disappeared when everything looks perfectly OK, looks like the drone just powered off in the air or some major failure has occurred on the RC side.

It's does not look like your fault so I believe it should be covered by warranty. Make sure that all flight logs in the phone are saved. There is no need to be devastated. Think about it positively - You are going to get a free new drone from DJI.

A bit early to make those promises I think ... let's see if the DAT can give us something more to go on.

Can see a possible scenario building on a bad connection between RC & mobile device ...

The winds were indicated to be just over the Mini spec (9-10m/s) at the end of the log, the OP backed towards HP in Sport mode with max negative elevator, reaching approx a pitch angle of 30 degrees which is according to spec & reached roughly 4m/s ...

IF ... the RC-device connection then crapped out (not connection RC-AC), then perhaps the OP released the sticks & started to fiddle in order to regain the "connection" believing that the RC-AC connection were lost. Meantime the AC hovered or possibly drifted slightly in the wind direction away from HP.

Then giving up hope & shutting down or stops pointing RC towards AC ... & by that really lose the RC-AC connection making the AC going into failsafe RTH with a much lower max pitch angle = much lower heading speed ... leading to actually starting a blow away. The battery level were 56% with a defined land % set to 20% when the log ended. Earlier during hover in Sport mode 1% was consumed roughly each 20sec ... meaning that it could have been 720sec hovering time left until autolanding started.

But again ... we will see once the DAT is available.