Yet another bird attack,

[A Bloke from Bloxwich]

I was shooting a beach run for an estate agency when the segulls got me!

I managed to get it back, limping home

Here is the resulting video

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Stealthy little blighter, was the gull visible at all in a frame ?
If not it certainly knew where to strike . . . from behind !

 

[Hidden]

I never saw a bird, except for the clickbait.

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

Could you see seagulls in the air around the drone?

 

[A Bloke from Bloxwich]

No I didn´t get the gulls on camera, it was about 1km away and as soon as i realised what was happening i flicked it onto sport and got out of there asap, they followed for a while, there was about 4 or 5 of them

 

[A Bloke from Bloxwich]

Ps It was not clickbait, just my sence of humor !

 

[twickers14]

Difficult to see how a gull or indeed any bird could make contact with a drone unless from underneath. Any approach from the top or side would surely condemn the critter to a life of feeding through a straw! My experience of getting in the way of the props (even with a Spark) is a minimum deep cut and a plaster but possibly a visit to A&E. Glad all well though and very strange especially as you didn’t see any gulls nearby.

 

[LongRifle]

If birds came in contact with the propellers I would think failsafe action would be to shut off all motors. It looks more like you had gimbal glitches.

 

[MS Coast]

I'd guess that the prop was broken during the "landing" rather than by a bird strike. Or perhaps the hub was cracked and the prop was wobbling during the flight and that accounted for the odd flight behavior.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Any approach from the top or side would surely condemn the critter to a life of feeding through a straw!

Hmm, now that I think of it, there are many one legged seagulls around !!

 

[FLDave]

Under VLOS control you would have been able to see the birds before any attack and head for a safe landing immediately. From the edited video it's hard to determine what really happened.

 

[Gringorio]

No I didn´t get the gulls on camera, it was about 1km away and as soon as i realised what was happening i flicked it onto sport and got out of there asap, they followed for a while, there was about 4 or 5 of them

Often times even more than speed to escape gulls is a rapid climb before returning home.

 

[SJGMoney]

Changes in altitude are your friend against birds, not lateral speed. I don't see any signs of birds in this video, doubting that was the problem.

 

[Gagey52]

You got your drone back good for you. My drones have been targeted on numerous occasions by the feathered warriors. Very few captured on video, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.
Regards

 

[Dbez1]

I’m glad you got it back!

 

[MS Coast]

Can this really be attributed to birds?

Looking at the video again, I see no birds anywhere during the flight. On the return, beginning at about 1:25 we see the final couple hundred or so yards of the flight and there are no birds visible waiting ahead. You suggest three bird strikes during the rest of the flight, when any birds colliding with the drone from the rear should have been visible to you.

Only one of the flight abnormalities, at about 1:04, where the drone rolled sharply left, seems to be what a bird might cause. The others are mostly quick yaw motions. It's difficult to see how a bird strike might cause that.

As for the missing prop causing control problems, I'd guess it would be unlikely that the drone could have flown at all with a missing prop and certainly without substantial vibration that would show up on the video.

A look at the flight logs might reveal more.

 

[cheddar-man]

Wow, very lucky to get it back with a prop missing, well done. Next time I would fly back over the land rather than the water just in case

 

[Yorkshire_Pud]

To be honest I would struggle to believe a bird strke could break a prop hub, I have had Mavic 2 blades hit solid wood, which would stop the blade dead in its tracks and then drag the blade 'backwards'/around-its-pivot until the blade could 'squeeze' past the edge of the wood.
The damage? The trailing edge of the what I assume was the striking blade had a chunk broken out of it.
Why? I think it was pushed so far around its pivot that the leading edge of the other blade smacked in to the trailing edge, the missing junk is perfectly postitioned for their meeting.

I would be inclined to think it is a fatigue crack that has grown over time.
If you do a google for "fatigue crack break surface in plastics photos" you may find some useful photos e.g. perhaps https://www.veryst.com/sites/defaul...lure_of_a_Plastic_Lever_Fracture_Surfaces.jpg
The surface of the break has characteristics indicative of the process acting at the time.

 

[A Bloke from Bloxwich]

I saw the gulls, just not on camera, a friend of mine here lost his drone to the sea in a very similar attack about 1 mile south of here, his attack was quite close to where he was, I was approx 1 km away, he says that they simply mobbed the drone. Like I said 4 or 5 of them followed the drone back.

The hub was and is perfect, the prop was not at the "landing site". I might try a "will it fly" experiment with the damaged prop to see if it could have got back without it, it was certainly difficult to control.

 

[MS Coast]

I saw the gulls, just not on camera, a friend of mine here lost his drone to the sea in a very similar attack about 1 mile south of here, his attack was quite close to where he was, I was approx 1 km away, he says that they simply mobbed the drone. Like I said 4 or 5 of them followed the drone back.

The hub was and is perfect, the prop was not at the "landing site". I might try a "will it fly" experiment with the damaged prop to see if it could have got back without it, it was certainly difficult to control.

No trying to be argumentative, but the hub is far from perfect. Only about half of it is still there, and the blade is missing. The missing blade may be buried in the sand where the drone hit and inverted.

Did you see the birds striking the drone during that last couple hundred yards of flight? Three of the flight disturbances took place in that portion of the flight.

The log file would be interesting to see. Several of the members here are very good at interpreting them and offer up their talent and services as volunteers.