Okay, so this is at least mostly pilot error but I still need to vent about it.
I received my DJI goggles this afternoon and was on my maiden voyage with them. Everything was going fantastic at first; the goggles are incredible (I have had the Mavic for about two months and consider myself to be a capable pilot during normal operation). Then I flipped the 5D stick down as usual to point the camera at the ground to land...except that the 5D vertical flip no longer controlled the camera; it controlled the flight mode.
Somehow in this mess (it happened VERY quickly; I have not yet attempted to reproduce the issue), I ended up in Tap-to-Fly mode, which I have never used before and was unaware of how it worked. All of a sudden my Mavic is driving directly towards the street with that stupid green arrow line and all I see in the goggles is my altitude dropping like I'm in a death spiral with two dead sticks. This all happened so quickly that I wasn't even aware of what happened at first; it wasn't until I researched the issue afterwards that I realized that Tap-to-Fly was a flight mode.
The first thing I did was hit that pause button which had no effect. Luckily, in my panic and button mashing of the controller, I tapped somewhere on my iPhone screen that yawed the Mavic to the right so that it hit one of my neighbor's large white pines, followed by a drop in to nice, soft bushes. I was very lucky; it could just as easily hit someone or something not so forgiving. Needless to say, I was freaked out. Luckily, the Magic didn't have a scratch on it (but I did have to clean pine tar off of it for about 15 minutes).
There are two lessons to be learned here. One; I am an idiot for not being familiar with all flight modes of the Mavic, although, in my defense, I was aware of how to change flight modes when not connected to the goggles and have actively avoided using any modes that I was unfamiliar with up this point. I accept that this was my fault and will be studying all capabilities of the craft before I put it back in the air.
Second (this is the venting part), the Tap-to-Fly mode was activated while I was wearing goggles that have no screen capable of tapping. Even if I knew what I was doing, I would have had to flip the goggles up corrected the flight path on my phone prior to impact (I was at ~150 feet but, had I been lower, this could be an issue); what would have happened if I didn't have a phone connected? Furthermore, even though I have since figured out what I should have done (5D stick again and switch back to normal operation), I have to wonder why DJI would consider screwing with the basic controls of the Mavic (i.e., the 5D stick controls) when connected to goggles without some type of explicit warning. It just seems like a recipe for disaster.
Other pertinent information: I was not in sport mode; however, the Mavic still did not stop when approaching the tree. My research found that this is common in Tap-to-Fly mode and may need to be addressed in a future firmware update.
Let me know what you think; is this entirely on my or am I right that there should be some software modifications to keep this from happening? I am okay with this being considered completely pilot error but the changing of the stick controls when connected to goggles is really going to stick in my crawl. I appreciate any feedback. Thank you.
I received my DJI goggles this afternoon and was on my maiden voyage with them. Everything was going fantastic at first; the goggles are incredible (I have had the Mavic for about two months and consider myself to be a capable pilot during normal operation). Then I flipped the 5D stick down as usual to point the camera at the ground to land...except that the 5D vertical flip no longer controlled the camera; it controlled the flight mode.
Somehow in this mess (it happened VERY quickly; I have not yet attempted to reproduce the issue), I ended up in Tap-to-Fly mode, which I have never used before and was unaware of how it worked. All of a sudden my Mavic is driving directly towards the street with that stupid green arrow line and all I see in the goggles is my altitude dropping like I'm in a death spiral with two dead sticks. This all happened so quickly that I wasn't even aware of what happened at first; it wasn't until I researched the issue afterwards that I realized that Tap-to-Fly was a flight mode.
The first thing I did was hit that pause button which had no effect. Luckily, in my panic and button mashing of the controller, I tapped somewhere on my iPhone screen that yawed the Mavic to the right so that it hit one of my neighbor's large white pines, followed by a drop in to nice, soft bushes. I was very lucky; it could just as easily hit someone or something not so forgiving. Needless to say, I was freaked out. Luckily, the Magic didn't have a scratch on it (but I did have to clean pine tar off of it for about 15 minutes).
There are two lessons to be learned here. One; I am an idiot for not being familiar with all flight modes of the Mavic, although, in my defense, I was aware of how to change flight modes when not connected to the goggles and have actively avoided using any modes that I was unfamiliar with up this point. I accept that this was my fault and will be studying all capabilities of the craft before I put it back in the air.
Second (this is the venting part), the Tap-to-Fly mode was activated while I was wearing goggles that have no screen capable of tapping. Even if I knew what I was doing, I would have had to flip the goggles up corrected the flight path on my phone prior to impact (I was at ~150 feet but, had I been lower, this could be an issue); what would have happened if I didn't have a phone connected? Furthermore, even though I have since figured out what I should have done (5D stick again and switch back to normal operation), I have to wonder why DJI would consider screwing with the basic controls of the Mavic (i.e., the 5D stick controls) when connected to goggles without some type of explicit warning. It just seems like a recipe for disaster.
Other pertinent information: I was not in sport mode; however, the Mavic still did not stop when approaching the tree. My research found that this is common in Tap-to-Fly mode and may need to be addressed in a future firmware update.
Let me know what you think; is this entirely on my or am I right that there should be some software modifications to keep this from happening? I am okay with this being considered completely pilot error but the changing of the stick controls when connected to goggles is really going to stick in my crawl. I appreciate any feedback. Thank you.
