Mini Mavic blow out over the ocean in Delaware, a mile out.

[PhoebeSnow]

A real bummer - sorry for your loss - even with the best of flying experience these often have a mind of their own it seems.

 

[sar104]

A real bummer - sorry for your loss - even with the best of flying experience these often have a mind of their own it seems.

That has nothing to do with it in cases such as this, where the wind is simply too strong.

 

[tfrank48]

So, my new mini mavic is gone. ?. And I'm posting this to help others.

I'm a mavic pro pilot and have been flying it for around 3 years now in many conditions.

So, I think that actually "hurt" me, cause I was use to the heavier UAV. And also a past experience with my Pro where the military took over control in the past, also messed up my judgement. (but that's another story).

The mini was new to me, only 25 flights, 4.21 hours total and 150,000 feet of distance. In that time, I've seen high wind warning come up often, but never had a problem changing elevation and continuing to fly and get back home.

Well we went to Ocean City, MD for new years and had a great time filming the waves and my family, sunsets, etc. It is winter and the off season, so no one to bother and it worked out great.

I was eager to get back home and see the good footage on our big screen.

Driving home we stopped at Indian River inlet in Delaware, a public beach area with huge parking lots and basically deserted, maybe 4 cars.

The ground air was calm and the bridge there is beautiful. So i thought, cool ! Let me get some more footage.

I took off from the beach, quickly rose to about 500 ft in sport mode so i didn't irritate the few people walking on the beach. Flew towards the ocean, still over the beach, turned around, flew towards the West and got a high wind warning (which happens a lot with this mini) and did notice it was slow going West.

I wanted the footage of the bridge too much too.

Flew to get a far view of the bridge and noticed it wasn't acting normal and wondered if there was some weird jamming or controlling frequency going on.

Descended coming back and flew around a rock jetty at low elevation. Then ascended again to get one more view of bridge. It would not fly west toward the bridge, so I flew South to try and get back to home and while doing so I did not pay attention to the Distance in feet away. I was looking across water mostly and high elevation and did not notice i was blown far out over the ocean.

I tried to fly back, but was loosing ground and it was creeping away. I checked several times that it was in sport mode, and it was. I thought some frequency was taking over the drone and flying it out to sea to destroy it. I then figured there might be some no fly zone due to the bridge that I didn't know about.

So, I would hit the return-to-home at times and it would loose significant distance (get further away) when I did.

I did think then, maybe it was wind and descended as I flew south west just to maybe get back to anywhere on the beach, finally I was getting slightly closer to home as I did this, but only creeping and I was now below 50% battery and worried about making it back.

I was making it back as long as I descended and full throttle forward. I stopped descending at around 20 feet off the water and once again was going farther out to sea.

I tried descending some more, but now was getting blown out to sea REALLY HARD. Tried to fly South, losing ground, tried North losing ground, 31% battery. Feeling the panic inside. Really felt someone was controlling it. Started ascending again, losing ground.

Sucked ! Tried flying south west again and descending fast like before where I gained distance back home, not working this time.

Pushed over a MILE OUT over the ocean.

Battery got low. It had to land in the water. Like 5,300 feet out at sea. This is how I remembered it, I could be slightly off here and there. I looked at my flight log a bit to write this too.

What I learned:
1. Mavic Mini can be blown off course quickly. Don't underestimate what the wind might be above you, even though the ground wind is near nothing. Pay attention to the wind warnings on the screen, don't shrug them off.
I should have landed when I was still over the beach when I got the first wind warning when I tried to fly West into the wind.
2 . Don't think everything is a conspiracy. ?
3. Pay CLOSE ATTENTION TO the distance numbers on the screen, especially if you get a wind warning. Even though you might not be flying pointed away, you might be getting blown away quickly and it's hard to notice when over water and not looking at land.
4. If over water and you are getting blown away. Try to come back at an angle to the wind like it did, while dropping in elevation; if you can. I think I stopped at around 20 feet elevation. When I was losing distance once I leveled out at 20 feet, I should have gone to a 2 feet over the water if I had too, to maybe get away from the wind. Your going to lose it anyway, go ahead and risk skimming the waves.

Hopefully this helps someone.

Oh ! and I have a question. Does anyone know if I can buy a mini; just the mini that matches my controller that I already have? Because I had bought the "fly more" kit, I should therefor get another mini if possible, to go with these extra batteries, etc.

I like the mini cause it's less noticeable. I don't have to have the FAA number on it or stay below 400 feet like I do with my mavic pro. Plus I've flown at night, etc, due to it's light weight not being a danger to aircraft.

Also my mavic pro might become illegal soon if the new FAA law goes into effect that says my pro needs an identification emitting software. I got an email from FAA a few weeks ago. (going to see if there is forum talk on this subject next).

So sorry for your loss!


Before flying my Mavic Mini [especially] I always check the "UAV Forecast" app.
You can check the Wind Profile & the forecast by the hour at a glance,
as well as other general conditions including:
Wind Direction, Sats Locked, Wind gusts, Visibility, Flight Zones Map etc.
note: you can change threshold settings.
[I do have other drones - Mavic Pro, Spark, Mavic 2Z and check the UAV Forecast app on those also.]
Including full screenshots, to be sure the info is plainly seen, without scrolling on by!

Hope this helps the many new MM pilots out there!

a couple of screenshots below:

 

[Schnauzergeek]

So, my new mini mavic is gone. [emoji20]. And I'm posting this to help others.

I'm a mavic pro pilot and have been flying it for around 3 years now in many conditions.

So, I think that actually "hurt" me, cause I was use to the heavier UAV. And also a past experience with my Pro where the military took over control in the past, also messed up my judgement. (but that's another story).

The mini was new to me, only 25 flights, 4.21 hours total and 150,000 feet of distance. In that time, I've seen high wind warning come up often, but never had a problem changing elevation and continuing to fly and get back home.

Well we went to Ocean City, MD for new years and had a great time filming the waves and my family, sunsets, etc. It is winter and the off season, so no one to bother and it worked out great.

I was eager to get back home and see the good footage on our big screen.

Driving home we stopped at Indian River inlet in Delaware, a public beach area with huge parking lots and basically deserted, maybe 4 cars.

The ground air was calm and the bridge there is beautiful. So i thought, cool ! Let me get some more footage.

I took off from the beach, quickly rose to about 500 ft in sport mode so i didn't irritate the few people walking on the beach. Flew towards the ocean, still over the beach, turned around, flew towards the West and got a high wind warning (which happens a lot with this mini) and did notice it was slow going West.

I wanted the footage of the bridge too much too.

Flew to get a far view of the bridge and noticed it wasn't acting normal and wondered if there was some weird jamming or controlling frequency going on.

Descended coming back and flew around a rock jetty at low elevation. Then ascended again to get one more view of bridge. It would not fly west toward the bridge, so I flew South to try and get back to home and while doing so I did not pay attention to the Distance in feet away. I was looking across water mostly and high elevation and did not notice i was blown far out over the ocean.

I tried to fly back, but was loosing ground and it was creeping away. I checked several times that it was in sport mode, and it was. I thought some frequency was taking over the drone and flying it out to sea to destroy it. I then figured there might be some no fly zone due to the bridge that I didn't know about.

So, I would hit the return-to-home at times and it would loose significant distance (get further away) when I did.

I did think then, maybe it was wind and descended as I flew south west just to maybe get back to anywhere on the beach, finally I was getting slightly closer to home as I did this, but only creeping and I was now below 50% battery and worried about making it back.

I was making it back as long as I descended and full throttle forward. I stopped descending at around 20 feet off the water and once again was going farther out to sea.

I tried descending some more, but now was getting blown out to sea REALLY HARD. Tried to fly South, losing ground, tried North losing ground, 31% battery. Feeling the panic inside. Really felt someone was controlling it. Started ascending again, losing ground.

Sucked ! Tried flying south west again and descending fast like before where I gained distance back home, not working this time.

Pushed over a MILE OUT over the ocean.

Battery got low. It had to land in the water. Like 5,300 feet out at sea. This is how I remembered it, I could be slightly off here and there. I looked at my flight log a bit to write this too.

What I learned:
1. Mavic Mini can be blown off course quickly. Don't underestimate what the wind might be above you, even though the ground wind is near nothing. Pay attention to the wind warnings on the screen, don't shrug them off.
I should have landed when I was still over the beach when I got the first wind warning when I tried to fly West into the wind.
2 . Don't think everything is a conspiracy. ?
3. Pay CLOSE ATTENTION TO the distance numbers on the screen, especially if you get a wind warning. Even though you might not be flying pointed away, you might be getting blown away quickly and it's hard to notice when over water and not looking at land.
4. If over water and you are getting blown away. Try to come back at an angle to the wind like it did, while dropping in elevation; if you can. I think I stopped at around 20 feet elevation. When I was losing distance once I leveled out at 20 feet, I should have gone to a 2 feet over the water if I had too, to maybe get away from the wind. Your going to lose it anyway, go ahead and risk skimming the waves.

Hopefully this helps someone.

Oh ! and I have a question. Does anyone know if I can buy a mini; just the mini that matches my controller that I already have? Because I had bought the "fly more" kit, I should therefor get another mini if possible, to go with these extra batteries, etc.

I like the mini cause it's less noticeable. I don't have to have the FAA number on it or stay below 400 feet like I do with my mavic pro. Plus I've flown at night, etc, due to it's light weight not being a danger to aircraft.

Also my mavic pro might become illegal soon if the new FAA law goes into effect that says my pro needs an identification emitting software. I got an email from FAA a few weeks ago. (going to see if there is forum talk on this subject next).

Wow!
I must be too much of a “boy scout”!
I never intentionally fly over 400ft AGL. It’s kinda boring to me because the view from that altitude of 400ft is usually a lot less detailed.
On the issue of an entity “taking over” the controls of your UAS, I’ve been advised that it doesn’t happen.
It is supposed to be illegal for anyone (not even a public safety entity like PD or FD) to take over the controls of your drone. Apparently it violates rules/laws comparable to wire tapping. They can track your location, find you and demand you to ground your drone but aren’t allowed to take over the control of your drone...yet.

 

[PhoebeSnow]

That has nothing to do with it in cases such as this, where the wind is simply too strong.

I realize that and ended with "it seems" meaning that while flying you often are not aware what you may be up against at that moment and the drone appears to want to do its own thing when in reality there is rationale reason for such issues like in this case - the wind.

 

[bp4life71]

rogue......Im not interested in the police state

 

[ajkm]

Seems wrong that I can shoot model rockets high and I think my brother can fly himself in his powered paraglider to 1000 feet.

Rockets don’t usually travel a great distance down range and a powered paraglider is a manned aircraft so of course can fly where an RPA can’t.

 

[paul050079]

I sometimes wonder what people expect of a device that weighs as little as 250 grams and what it is capable of, its featherweight and is limited to a maximum wind capability of just 8 kph, flying at any kind of altitude where there is little more than a breeze at ground level is going to easily take the mini over this threshold, the problem is that the dip angle even in sport mode when driven into the wind Is not enough to defeat high wind speeds which is where the “Air” or “Pro’s” have a much bigger advantage having a much greater dip angle in sports mode.
If you have a mini and there is any kind of wind/ strong breeze at ground level don’t fly at high altitudes and keep it close and over ground only
Happy flying

 

[sirbadger]

I sometimes wonder what people expect of a device that weighs as little as 250 grams and what it is capable of, its featherweight and is limited to a maximum wind capability of just 8 kph, flying at any kind of altitude where there is little more than a breeze at ground level is going to easily take the mini over this threshold, the problem is that the dip angle even in sport mode when driven into the wind Is not enough to defeat high wind speeds which is where the “Air” or “Pro’s” have a much bigger advantage having a much greater dip angle in sports mode.
If you have a mini and there is any kind of wind/ strong breeze at ground level don’t fly at high altitudes and keep it close and over ground only
Happy flying

It's 8m/s, which is 29kph.

 

[Meta4]

I sometimes wonder what people expect of a device that weighs as little as 250 grams and what it is capable of, its featherweight and is limited to a maximum wind capability of just 8 kph

The Mini isn't that slow .. Check that conversion again
Max Speed (near sea level, no wind) 8 m/s (P Mode) = 28.8 km/hr
Or .. 13 m/s (S Mode) = 46.8 km/hr

The weight isn't really a relevant factor.
Here's a racing drone that weigh less than half what the Mini does:

BNF Eachine Lizard 95 (76 mph) - COMPLETE Parts List | FPV Drone Reviews

Go FPV Drone Racing at 76 mph for $235 with the Eachine Lizard 95, a mini-BNF drone boasting a thrust-to-weight ratio close to 6. All parts required for FPV flight can be purchased for $235 from Banggood (see table below) but make sure to select the ‘Compatible Flysky Receiver’ option for your...

fpvdronereviews.com

It can fly at 122 km.hr

 

[TheXmanJDD]

Rockets don’t usually travel a great distance down range and a powered paraglider is a manned aircraft so of course can fly where an RPA can’t.

As I mentioned in the guide, you can either post the logs here directly or upload them to PhantomHelp or AirData and then post the link.

Speed is a scalar quantity, not a vector quantity. Unlike velocity, which is speed in a particular direction (in the logs, velocity is given in the orthogonal north and east directions) and can be positive or negative, speed is always positive.

As pointed out by @Keule, in the flight that you linked to the wind was out of the west and too strong for the Mini.

Thank you on the speed vs velocity education! Makes sense.

 

[TheXmanJDD]

Extremely valuable app @tfrank48 !

I'll get it. Thank you.

 

[TheXmanJDD]

Wow!
I must be too much of a “boy scout”!
I never intentionally fly over 400ft AGL. It’s kinda boring to me because the view from that altitude of 400ft is usually a lot less detailed.
On the issue of an entity “taking over” the controls of your UAS, I’ve been advised that it doesn’t happen.
It is supposed to be illegal for anyone (not even a public safety entity like PD or FD) to take over the controls of your drone. Apparently it violates rules/laws comparable to wire tapping. They can track your location, find you and demand you to ground your drone but aren’t allowed to take over the control of your drone...yet.

? hmmm, the military does what they want, i believe and i've seen that with other situations (not with drones, but other things). And it makes sense that they should have something in place that automatically takes over a UAV if it flys into their airspace. You're telling me when say the president does an outside speech that there isn't a bubble of airspace that takes over drone control? There has to be. A jammer that makes them drop wouldn't make sense either, cause u could have c4 on it with a timer, fly really high and descend into the speech area, if it drops, it shouldn't matter. It makes sense to take over the control and fly it away.

 

[sar104]

? hmmm, the military does what they want, i believe and i've seen that with other situations (not with drones, but other things). And it makes sense that they should have something in place that automatically takes over a UAV if it flys into their airspace. You're telling me when say the president does an outside speech that there isn't a bubble of airspace that takes over drone control? There has to be. A jammer that makes them drop wouldn't make sense either, cause u could have c4 on it with a timer, fly really high and descend into the speech area, if it drops, it shouldn't matter. It makes sense to take over the control and fly it away.

Currently there are four government agencies with federal authorization to both detect and neutralized sUAS threats: Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Justice. Those counter-UAV systems cannot take over control however - they just detect and jam the control link, forcing the UAV into failsafe mode.

 

[TheXmanJDD]

Currently there are four government agencies with federal authorization to both detect and neutralized sUAS threats: Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Justice. Those counter-UAV systems cannot take over control however - they just detect and jam the control link, forcing the UAV into failsafe mode.

Interesting. We should save this talk for my other post i'll make. I can't wait to see what u think of the flight data.

I'll ask u there, what is "failsafe mode" which is hovering in place i suppose.

I just had a thought. Maybe i'll run my flight record past the military base first. To make sure there's no info in there they don't want seen. Cause if u say that they can't fly it away and records show differently. I don't want to put that out there .

Yeah. I'll contact them.

 

[DoomMeister]

Thank you all that responded with this.

Apparently information I read convinced me that the mini was allowed to go over 400 feet.

What's clever about making it 249 grams then? Just so you don't have to pay $5.00 and/or write an FAA number on it? That's STUPID.

I'm not likely going to buy another one then. What a waste. Seems like the non-registering is just for people that want to break the rules then.

Anyone want to buy 2 new batteries, charger, case and controller? I seriously am bummed out right now and might get rid of them.

And go into making racing drones instead.

I'll be honest, I've taken it up to 1,640 feet several times on calm evenings and it's amazing how far I was able to see. Yeah, I guess I just admitted to breaking the law. It was truly unknowingly and if the FAA is going to come after me for this, then they got way too many employees and time on their hand.

Sharing it, just to show, there are people like me that don't know.

Seems wrong that I can shoot model rockets high and I think my brother can fly himself in his powered paraglider to 1000 feet.

Being sub 250 grams means more in other countries than in the USA. It removes several restrictions for those in Canada and the EU.

 

[RayKelly]

So, my new mini mavic is gone. ?. And I'm posting this to help others.

I'm a mavic pro pilot and have been flying it for around 3 years now in many conditions.

So, I think that actually "hurt" me, cause I was use to the heavier UAV. And also a past experience with my Pro where the military took over control in the past, also messed up my judgement. (but that's another story).

The mini was new to me, only 25 flights, 4.21 hours total and 150,000 feet of distance. In that time, I've seen high wind warning come up often, but never had a problem changing elevation and continuing to fly and get back home.

Well we went to Ocean City, MD for new years and had a great time filming the waves and my family, sunsets, etc. It is winter and the off season, so no one to bother and it worked out great.

I was eager to get back home and see the good footage on our big screen.

Driving home we stopped at Indian River inlet in Delaware, a public beach area with huge parking lots and basically deserted, maybe 4 cars.

The ground air was calm and the bridge there is beautiful. So i thought, cool ! Let me get some more footage.

I took off from the beach, quickly rose to about 500 ft in sport mode so i didn't irritate the few people walking on the beach. Flew towards the ocean, still over the beach, turned around, flew towards the West and got a high wind warning (which happens a lot with this mini) and did notice it was slow going West.

I wanted the footage of the bridge too much too.

Flew to get a far view of the bridge and noticed it wasn't acting normal and wondered if there was some weird jamming or controlling frequency going on.

Descended coming back and flew around a rock jetty at low elevation. Then ascended again to get one more view of bridge. It would not fly west toward the bridge, so I flew South to try and get back to home and while doing so I did not pay attention to the Distance in feet away. I was looking across water mostly and high elevation and did not notice i was blown far out over the ocean.

I tried to fly back, but was loosing ground and it was creeping away. I checked several times that it was in sport mode, and it was. I thought some frequency was taking over the drone and flying it out to sea to destroy it. I then figured there might be some no fly zone due to the bridge that I didn't know about.

So, I would hit the return-to-home at times and it would loose significant distance (get further away) when I did.

I did think then, maybe it was wind and descended as I flew south west just to maybe get back to anywhere on the beach, finally I was getting slightly closer to home as I did this, but only creeping and I was now below 50% battery and worried about making it back.

I was making it back as long as I descended and full throttle forward. I stopped descending at around 20 feet off the water and once again was going farther out to sea.

I tried descending some more, but now was getting blown out to sea REALLY HARD. Tried to fly South, losing ground, tried North losing ground, 31% battery. Feeling the panic inside. Really felt someone was controlling it. Started ascending again, losing ground.

Sucked ! Tried flying south west again and descending fast like before where I gained distance back home, not working this time.

Pushed over a MILE OUT over the ocean.

Battery got low. It had to land in the water. Like 5,300 feet out at sea. This is how I remembered it, I could be slightly off here and there. I looked at my flight log a bit to write this too.

What I learned:
1. Mavic Mini can be blown off course quickly. Don't underestimate what the wind might be above you, even though the ground wind is near nothing. Pay attention to the wind warnings on the screen, don't shrug them off.
I should have landed when I was still over the beach when I got the first wind warning when I tried to fly West into the wind.
2 . Don't think everything is a conspiracy. ?
3. Pay CLOSE ATTENTION TO the distance numbers on the screen, especially if you get a wind warning. Even though you might not be flying pointed away, you might be getting blown away quickly and it's hard to notice when over water and not looking at land.
4. If over water and you are getting blown away. Try to come back at an angle to the wind like it did, while dropping in elevation; if you can. I think I stopped at around 20 feet elevation. When I was losing distance once I leveled out at 20 feet, I should have gone to a 2 feet over the water if I had too, to maybe get away from the wind. Your going to lose it anyway, go ahead and risk skimming the waves.

Hopefully this helps someone.

Oh ! and I have a question. Does anyone know if I can buy a mini; just the mini that matches my controller that I already have? Because I had bought the "fly more" kit, I should therefor get another mini if possible, to go with these extra batteries, etc.

I like the mini cause it's less noticeable. I don't have to have the FAA number on it or stay below 400 feet like I do with my mavic pro. Plus I've flown at night, etc, due to it's light weight not being a danger to aircraft.

Also my mavic pro might become illegal soon if the new FAA law goes into effect that says my pro needs an identification emitting software. I got an email from FAA a few weeks ago. (going to see if there is forum talk on this subject next).

Good story. Lessons to be learned. Sorry you lost it.

 

[Meta4]

Interesting. We should save this talk for my other post i'll make. I can't wait to see what u think of the flight data.

I'll ask u there, what is "failsafe mode" which is hovering in place i suppose.

I just had a thought. Maybe i'll run my flight record past the military base first. To make sure there's no info in there they don't want seen. Cause if u say that they can't fly it away and records show differently. I don't want to put that out there .

Yeah. I'll contact them.

It might be interesting to see that data.
Failsafe is just whatever Loss of Signal action you have set.
The default is RTH but you can set Hover or Land.
The data won't have any military secrets.
it will just show where your drone was, how high, how fast etc.

 

[TheXmanJDD]

Being sub 250 grams means more in other countries than in the USA. It removes several restrictions for those in Canada and the EU.

AH ! and when the FAA makes all UAVs have to put out a Remote ID signal, over 250 grams, then the mavic mini will become important.

 

[TheXmanJDD]

It might be interesting to see that data.
Failsafe is just whatever Loss of Signal action you have set.
The default is RTH but you can set Hover or Land.
The data won't have any military secrets.
it will just show where your drone was, how high, how fast etc.

What would stop an RC jet with real turbine going 400+ mph towards a speech?
Taking over the signal and steering away would make a lot of sense.

I was just at the computer to look up the Army email address contact and had a thought. They don't know me. If they had a system in place, they won't want to answer that question of whether I should show the flight record or not, because if they answered , "NO, don't share the flight log." that says something and what if I was just baiting them. So, there is no use asking them. I'll get my stuff together and try to share tonight.