My Mavic 3 flew away - Any Help Please with Location

[Suren]

I am so upset right now. Did a flight this morning and the drone was going well and then at around a couple of hundred meters it disconnected and only reconnected when it came back and was a few feet over my head. I landed the drone checked it, replaced the battery and decided to take off from my deck. Checked the waypoint HyperLapse to see why I cannot set my speed and then decided to do a Master Shots video. Drone disconnected again and decided to stay one place and after a few seconds turned and flew in the opposite direction. I quickly jumped into the car and tried to follow it but lost it when it went over the hills. I am so upset right now that my $4500 investment decided to do this. This is totally not on and unacceptable to me. I wish I could use vulgar languages on here now but I can't. I know this is a long shot but if anyone can direct this log and maybe, just maybe tell me where it land I would be forever grateful. I will upload the screen recording video of when it disconnected while doing the mastershots.
Log from flyaway:
DJI Flight Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

Log from first flight this morning, also disconnected but returned promptly:
DJI Flight Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

I also noticed while watching the screen recording is that the vision sensors showed not working although it is a bright sunny day.

 

[Suren]

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[Mantrain]

I know this is upsetting but I have solid experience here and each time DJI replaced my drone through warranty. Once for an AIR 2S and another Mini2. For the Mavic 3, one of mine crashed from a propeller that detached in flight. In all three cases DJI replaced through warranty not even making me use my Refresh.

In each case DJI analyzed my flight logs and found in my favour I presume they will do same for you.

 

[Suren]

I know this is upsetting but I have solid experience here and each time DJI replaced my drone through warranty. Once for an AIR 2S and another Mini2. For the Mavic 3, one of mine crashed from a propeller that detached in flight. In all three cases DJI replaced through warranty not even making me use my Refresh.

In each case DJI analyzed my flight logs and found in my favour I presume they will do same for you.

I am trying to log a case with them but getting a error 404, not available when going to their support page. How do I open a case with them. I am literally losing my mind because such an expensive drone decided to fly away.

 

[Mantrain]

I am trying to log a case with them but getting a error 404, not available when going to their support page. How do I open a case with them. I am literally losing my mind because such an expensive drone decided to fly away.

well here is what you can do. send DJI an email, support@DJI,.com. however they may redirect you to the support portal so you may want to explain the issue in the email. It is the weekend so nothing will happen now anyways. Also during business hours you can chat with them.

The bad side of this is you will not have a Mavic 3 for two or three weeks. Well could be less but just say two weeks depending on if you live near a shipping center. I am in San Diego and they ship from S CA so I am lucky but they also ship out of TX.

Once recently my Mini 2 just disconnected in mid flight -- no reason that I could understand. Did not return either. Could not locate. They are sending me a new one I have the shipping confirmation.

For the Air2S, something similar, but it did not totally disconnect. The video showed a land but I could not ever locate it. Why it did not RTH was mystery. In each case they warrantied me

 

[Suren]

well here is what you can do. send DJI an email, support@DJI,.com. however they may redirect you to the support portal so you may want to explain the issue in the email. It is the weekend so nothing will happen now anyways. Also during business hours you can chat with them.

The bad side of this is you will not have a Mavic 3 for two or three weeks. Well could be less but just say two weeks depending on if you live near a shipping center. I am in San Diego and they ship from S CA so I am lucky but they also ship out of TX.

Once recently my Mini 2 just disconnected in mid flight -- no reason that I could understand. Did not return either. Could not locate. They are sending me a new one I have the shipping confirmation.

For the Air2S, something similar, but it did not totally disconnect. The video showed a land but I could not ever locate it. Why it did not RTH was mystery. In each case they warrantied me

Thanks for that information, I will email them now.

 

[Mantrain]

also in you email send then your name, shipping address, tel, SN # of controller and aircraft and of course the flight data.
No one knows more about warranty service than Mantrain.

 

[Suren]

also in you email send then your name, shipping address, tel, SN # of controller and aircraft and of course the flight data.
No one knows more about warranty service than Mantrain.

Thanks Mate

 

[slup]

... just maybe tell me where it land I would be forever grateful.

I'm afraid it's far to little data to say anything about what happened & where it may have touched down.

Both your video & log show everything up to the point where it disconnects ... then nothing, no one but you know in what direction it flew after that.

-No yaw error seems to be a cause, both the video & log confirms that the yaw direction was correct.
-No problems with the HP ... seems to be recorded in the correct location.
-Failsafe action set to Go Home.
-Full GPS reception.

You start out with a dronie, then a circle ... & then initiate a "Pitch up+Fly forward" ... then nothing. You had 88% battery left when this happens ... so being up on 92m height it would have flown VERY far.

 

[Deleted member 103366]

I have a bad feeling about this, the warning message at the top of the screen at the end of the video is "RC not connected to mob". At the start of the video the message is "Aircraft not connected to".
The bad feeling is, I think the former is telling you that the phone is not connected to the controller and that the controller had a connection to the drone.
The latter message was "the controller and drone are not connected" warning, if you notice it disappears at 4 second, just before the camera view comes on screen i.e. when the connection between the controller and the drone was established.
If I am correct then you 'could', in theory, have flown the drone home.
Why the drone moved with no apparent stick input I will leave to others, similarly what would have happened if you had given stick commands.
If the drone behaved itself then I think it should have hovered at the place where the phone/controller disconnection occurred UNTIL the low battery RTH kicked in but I am not sure where to look for what %age the drone thought the low battery RTH should be triggered for that particular distance, what I thought should be the place to look is empty.
You would need to check what the low battery RTH behaviour is.
If the drone continued to move uncommanded then all bets as to it's location are off.
I do not know where in the log to look for information about what the OA was seeing.

 

[sar104]

I am so upset right now. Did a flight this morning and the drone was going well and then at around a couple of hundred meters it disconnected and only reconnected when it came back and was a few feet over my head. I landed the drone checked it, replaced the battery and decided to take off from my deck. Checked the waypoint HyperLapse to see why I cannot set my speed and then decided to do a Master Shots video. Drone disconnected again and decided to stay one place and after a few seconds turned and flew in the opposite direction. I quickly jumped into the car and tried to follow it but lost it when it went over the hills. I am so upset right now that my $4500 investment decided to do this. This is totally not on and unacceptable to me. I wish I could use vulgar languages on here now but I can't. I know this is a long shot but if anyone can direct this log and maybe, just maybe tell me where it land I would be forever grateful. I will upload the screen recording video of when it disconnected while doing the mastershots.
Log from flyaway:
DJI Flight Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

Log from first flight this morning, also disconnected but returned promptly:
DJI Flight Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

I also noticed while watching the screen recording is that the vision sensors showed not working although it is a bright sunny day.

The aircraft was flying just fine and the problem was that your mobile device disconnected from the RC.

Can you be more specific about what happened? You said that the drone disconnected again, then flew in the opposite direction (opposite to what?) and then went over the hills (which hills?).

 

[Etdronehome]

I noticed in the video you had max height at 15m. How did the drone get past that limit to 92m as @slup got from the log???

 

[sar104]

I noticed in the video you had max height at 15m. How did the drone get past that limit to 92m as @slup got from the log???

Maximum height was set at 306 m (1004 ft).

 

[Suren]

I'm afraid it's far to little data to say anything about what happened & where it may have touched down.

Both your video & log show everything up to the point where it disconnects ... then nothing, no one but you know in what direction it flew after that.

-No yaw error seems to be a cause, both the video & log confirms that the yaw direction was correct.
-No problems with the HP ... seems to be recorded in the correct location.
-Failsafe action set to Go Home.
-Full GPS reception.

You start out with a dronie, then a circle ... & then initiate a "Pitch up+Fly forward" ... then nothing. You had 88% battery left when this happens ... so being up on 92m height it would have flown VERY far.

I followed it to the best I could up to some forests by a hill and then I lost sight of it.

 

[slup]

Can also add in this ...

The velocity difference between the GPS & IMU takes a turn to the worse at 150sec into the flight, pink area in the chart is the period when you make the dronie, circle & pitch up+fly forward.

Something is clearly going on ... this can possibly indicate IMU problems ...

 

[Etdronehome]

Maximum height was set at 306 m (1004 ft).

I not challenging your knowledge or statement but at 3:50 of the video it shows this

 

[Suren]

I have a bad feeling about this, the warning message at the top of the screen at the end of the video is "RC not connected to mob". At the start of the video the message is "Aircraft not connected to".
The bad feeling is, I think the former is telling you that the phone is not connected to the controller and that the controller had a connection to the drone.
The latter message was "the controller and drone are not connected" warning, if you notice it disappears at 4 second, just before the camera view comes on screen i.e. when the connection between the controller and the drone was established.
If I am correct then you 'could', in theory, have flown the drone home.
Why the drone moved with no apparent stick input I will leave to others, similarly what would have happened if you had given stick commands.
If the drone behaved itself then I think it should have hovered at the place where the phone/controller disconnection occurred UNTIL the low battery RTH kicked in but I am not sure where to look for what %age the drone thought the low battery RTH should be triggered for that distance, what I thought should be the place to look is empty. Y
ou would need to check what the low battery RTH behaviour is.
If the drone continued to move uncommanded then all bets as to it's location are off.
I do not know where in the log to look for information about what the OA was seeing.

It did suffer a connection issue in the previous flight as well. Disconnected from RC completely and only connected again when it was a few feet over head. I assumed it might have been an issue taking off from my deck(made of wood only) and took off with a full battery from my driveway. There was also an error of vision sensors in the screen recording at the beginning as well. When the drone disconnected during the master shots video the RC had no connection at all, the RC lights were flashing on/off showing no signal

 

[sar104]

Can also add in this ...

The velocity difference between the GPS & IMU takes a turn to the worse at 150sec into the flight, pink area in the chart is the period when you make the dronie, circle & pitch up+fly forward.

Something is clearly going on ... this can possibly indicate IMU problems ...

View attachment 141552

No - you have to pay attention to the scale - those numbers are very small and well within expected bounds:

 

[sar104]

I not challenging your knowledge or statement but at 3:50 of the video it shows this

View attachment 141553

It's disconnected by then. The max height was 306 m throughout the flight - it's one of the logged parameters.

 

[Suren]

The aircraft was flying just fine and the problem was that your mobile device disconnected from the RC.

Can you be more specific about what happened? You said that the drone disconnected again, then flew in the opposite direction (opposite to what?) and then went over the hills (which hills?).

The aircraft was flying fine during my first flight, check my reply PhillusFogg. The drone turn around after disconnection and flew away from me like it had another homeport in its system ( as hard as that is to believe).