My Mavic 3 flew away - Any Help Please with Location

[Baron von Richthofen]

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).

Is there any chance it was returning to a previously logged homepoint? Wherever it was going it seemed pretty keen.

 

[Baron von Richthofen]

Haven't read the entire thread so this has probably been said, but that sounds dead-on like RTH behavior with either a messed up GPS, or a mislocated (somehow) home point.

No theory on how either could happen, but that doesn't change the profile of the behavior – stop, hover for 15 seconds, turn in direction of home, head there.

The automated hover, delay, then yaw is a dead giveaway.

Absolutely agree. It crossed my mind it was returning to a previously logged homepoint. No idea why though.

 

[Meta4]

Is there any chance it was returning to a previously logged homepoint? Wherever it was going it seemed pretty keen.

No chance at all., that cannot happen.
The homepoint that gets stored in the drone disappears when the drone is switched off, and when it starts up again it has no home point until it gets good GPS location data again.

Absolutely agree. It crossed my mind it was returning to a previously logged homepoint. No idea why though.

As was explained earlier in this thread, the stored homepoint in the drone at the end of flight data, was exactly the same as when it was first recorded.
If the drone was returning to a stored home point (as it's programmed to on loss of signal), it would have returned home.
This idea of mistakenly RTH-ing to an incorrect home point doesn't stand up to analysis.

This was already explained to the guy you are agreeing with .. the one who didn't read the thread or look at flight data.

 

[EpicFlight]

Very upsetting that I need to pay to get the drone from Aussie to New Zealand and must make my own arrangements to pick it up. I see so many where Dji ships the drone out at their costs, why do I need to sort this out myself. The below is from the chat with the DJI support guy now.

If you didn't live in some Pygmy jungle only accessible on the back of trained baboons this wouldn't be a problem!

 

[zeusfl]

Very upsetting that I need to pay to get the drone from Aussie to New Zealand and must make my own arrangements to pick it up. I see so many where Dji ships the drone out at their costs, why do I need to sort this out myself. The below is from the chat with the DJI support guy now.

That sucks. New Zeeland laws should obligate DJI to process warranties including shipping. If they allow DJI to sell their product in your country then they need to do the full services. Not fair.

 

[Suren]

If you didn't live in some Pygmy jungle only accessible on the back of trained baboons this wouldn't be a problem!

hahahaha

 

[Suren]

That sucks. New Zeeland laws should obligate DJI to process warranties including shipping. If they allow DJI to sell their product in your country then they need to do the full services. Not fair.

I know right. I spoke to the local Dji dealer here and he said that he will try to get it for me.

 

[EpicFlight]

I'm holding out for, like the dog in that movie the traveled 400 miles to find its owner, you'll find it sitting on your picnic table in the backyard in a few weeks, a little dirty and a little scuffed up, but still working great!


It loves you, @Suren, and is desperately trying to get back to you!

 

[canadian drone videos]

That sucks, please let us know if DJI covers you on warranty. Good luck mate.

 

[Meta4]

That sucks, please let us know if DJI covers you on warranty. Good luck mate.

Or ... you could read the thread where that's already explained.

 

[Suren]

Finally here

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Hey, that's great !
Hopefully this one will 'behave' itself.

Did the local NZ agent or DJI Australia end up covering the shipping ?
That would have been pretty negligible anyway, but shouldn't have to come out of your pocket.

 

[zeusfl]

I am happy For you buddy!!

 

[Suren]

Hey, that's great !
Hopefully this one will 'behave' itself.

Did the local NZ agent or DJI Australia end up covering the shipping ?
That would have been pretty negligible anyway, but shouldn't have to come out of your pocket.

Dji in Aussie sent it so all went well.

 

[Suren]

I am happy For you buddy!!

Thanks Mate

 

[ianwood]

1. It was conducting a master shot at the time. Maybe it was still doing the master shot sequence when the app stopped responding. A malfunction in master shots perhaps? Or when master shots aborts?

Another report of losing control while doing master shots:

Mavic 3 flew away & crashed out of nowhere

Hey guys, So i've just bought the Mavic 3 two days ago and took it for it's third flight. I was doing a mastershot and the drone/camera already started wobling slowly as you can see here: https://youtu.be/XTbHaXImxpI That isn't supposed to happen ofcourse so i cancelled it and wanted to check...

forum.dji.com

 

[Suren]

Another report of losing control while doing master shots:

Mavic 3 flew away & crashed out of nowhere

Hey guys, So i've just bought the Mavic 3 two days ago and took it for it's third flight. I was doing a mastershot and the drone/camera already started wobling slowly as you can see here: https://youtu.be/XTbHaXImxpI That isn't supposed to happen ofcourse so i cancelled it and wanted to check...

forum.dji.com

Yup I read that post but that guy is lucky it flew into a tree while flying away from him so he got the drone back.

 

[BlairAir]

Yeah that is true. I enjoy flying the Autel but they also have major issues and bugs to deal with just like Dji. The good thing about Dji is that they will respond to you an their forum, Autel support is non existent even when I emailed them directly 4 times-no response.

I have a V2 Evo 2 Pro/V2 Smart Controller and of 11 cases I opened with Autel they worked )or responded I should say on exactly ONE and that was only for 2 email exchanges and then dropped. I believe people that actually get support from Autel do so by calling and speaking directly to a rep. Email support is 100% nonexistent over 8 months of Autel Ownership. Lite + has an outstanding camera, but so did Evo 2. Their software- specifically Autel Sky and firmware are more feature rich than Autel Explorer, especially the poor stepchild Android version that's still waiting for features promised in July 2021, in spite of being the OS on their $1200 controller, but the amount of bugs aren't the issue. It's Autels inability, unwillingness and zero tenacity to resolve them that completely dampens the experience. Absolutely top level hardware, near top level aircraft design, paired with elementary school level software engineering..Correction: Elementary School dropout level engineering. I only keep the Great Pumpkin for the excellent Waypoint Missions which are terrific in spite of the many, many bugs that will almost certainly never be fixed. Not to mention what I believe was a set of outright lies about "chip supply issues" that created the V1/V2 fiasco. It was the V1 chipset being on the US Governments Entity list and Autels hunger for Government and Govt. Contractor sales, period IMO. I have a lot of evidence but this is not the place. Sorry for the rant.. I shall return you back to your regularly scheduled thread !

 

[Suren]

I have a V2 Evo 2 Pro/V2 Smart Controller and of 11 cases I opened with Autel they worked )or responded I should say on exactly ONE and that was only for 2 email exchanges and then dropped. I believe people that actually get support from Autel do so by calling and speaking directly to a rep. Email support is 100% nonexistent over 8 months of Autel Ownership. Lite + has an outstanding camera, but so did Evo 2. Their software- specifically Autel Sky and firmware are more feature rich than Autel Explorer, especially the poor stepchild Android version that's still waiting for features promised in July 2021, in spite of being the OS on their $1200 controller, but the amount of bugs aren't the issue. It's Autels inability, unwillingness and zero tenacity to resolve them that completely dampens the experience. Absolutely top level hardware, near top level aircraft design, paired with elementary school level software engineering..Correction: Elementary School dropout level engineering. I only keep the Great Pumpkin for the excellent Waypoint Missions which are terrific in spite of the many, many bugs that will almost certainly never be fixed. Not to mention what I believe was a set of outright lies about "chip supply issues" that created the V1/V2 fiasco. It was the V1 chipset being on the US Governments Entity list and Autels hunger for Government and Govt. Contractor sales, period IMO. I have a lot of evidence but this is not the place. Sorry for the rant.. I shall return you back to your regularly scheduled thread !

Yeah, If Autel can get their customer service up to scratch they will surely give Dji a run for their money. I am basically still waiting for them to reply. I managed to find an Autel Support in New Zealand that supplies these drones and still waiting on him as well. I must say they rolled out 2 updates pretty quick to fix some bugs but my replacement that i got from the dealer is giving camera vibrations and Gimbal error.

 

[FlySkyJumper]

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.

You should be able to see the last coordinates from your remote within the app and the flight logs as well up until the battery ran out.

Unless you were flying it some place you weren't supposed to like near an airport, prison that sort of thing for example and they took over your drone? Who knows. Not saying you were, but might wanna check what airspace you were flying in or even close to. What we do know is 80% of drone owners according to he FAA have their drones fly away within the first year of ownership. Not saying those fly aways aren't recoverable, but that's what they clame. I've had several drone disconnects, but it's usually always because the drone or remote experiences interference. For example, electrical towers or it doesn't have the best signal to my drone as in flying in the mtns. OR, you mentioned flying from your deck. If you go inside your home after take off from your deck there's all sorts of issues that can happen to cause interference that can cause disconnects from the controller to the drone. Causing fly aways. Fortunately it has always returned home.

good luck!