R.I.P. Mav 3 Pro

akdrone · 2025-04-27T12:11:01-0400

Flying less than 300 feet away over water that was not still (had ripples) my Mav 3 Pro was about 20 feet over the river when, according to a fisherman that was looking directly at it, it "flipped over and dove straight into the river". I thought for a moment I had just lost connection for some reason but obviously could not get it back. It was too deep for me to wade out to try to find and I have Flyaway insurance so that was that. DJI has verified it and is hopefully sending a replacement soon that I hope gets through customs. I also have State Farm insurance on it in the event that it can't get through customs. No rhyme or reason for this as far as I can tell. No wires....was looking forward and it was being directly viewed by a guy so it wasn't a bird strike either. Just decided to take a bath as far as I can tell. I've heard stories of such things and generally dismissed them as pilot error but it's been many years since I've made a mistake so it can't be that.

. Just one more thing in my life I'll never understand. Luckily I never sold my Mav 3 so there is that (and my other 4 drones)

Mrktn · 2025-04-27T12:20:49-0400

Sorry to hear this.

Maybe post your flight log for the experts to analyse. Not that it’ll matter much as you’re getting a replacement soon.

The bond between human and bird…

jaja6009 · 2025-04-27T13:41:40-0400

akdrone said:
Flying less than 300 feet away over water that was not still (had ripples) my Mav 3 Pro was about 20 feet over the river when, according to a fisherman that was looking directly at it, it "flipped over and dove straight into the river". I thought for a moment I had just lost connection for some reason but obviously could not get it back. It was too deep for me to wade out to try to find and I have Flyaway insurance so that was that. DJI has verified it and is hopefully sending a replacement soon that I hope gets through customs. I also have State Farm insurance on it in the event that it can't get through customs. No rhyme or reason for this as far as I can tell. No wires....was looking forward and it was being directly viewed by a guy so it wasn't a bird strike either. Just decided to take a bath as far as I can tell. I've heard stories of such things and generally dismissed them as pilot error but it's been many years since I've made a mistake so it can't be that. . Just one more thing in my life I'll never understand. Luckily I never sold my Mav 3 so there is that (and my other 4 drones)

Sorry to hear about your drone. Hopefully you will be made whole in the near future.

Chrislaf · 2025-04-27T15:35:45-0400

Sorry to hear about your drone. Hopefully you won't have any problems getting your replacement from DJI. As Mrktn mentioned above consider posting the flight log. It would be interesting to see if the experts on here can determine the cause so we can learn from the incident.

Chris

Meta4 · 2025-04-27T17:07:28-0400

akdrone said:
No rhyme or reason for this as far as I can tell.

There is always a reason behind any drone incident.

akdrone said:
Just decided to take a bath as far as I can tell.

Drones don't "just decide to take a bath".

akdrone said:
Just one more thing in my life I'll never understand.

You'll never understand the cause of your incident if you never make the effort to find out about the incident.

Your app has a "black box" data recorder that can often explain what happened.
If you want to learn from the experience and be able to avoid similar occurrences:

To post your flight data there are a couple of options ...

1. 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 on the flight data.
Come back and post a link to the report it provides and someone might be able to analyse it and give you an understanding of the cause of the incident.
or
2. Just post the .txt file here
or
3. If you use Airdata, you can view the flight data on Airdata and post a link for the Airdata report

If you are using one of the controllers with an integrated screen, the txt files are to be found here:
Android\data\dji.go.v5\files\FlightRecord