Litchi waypoint mission goes awry

[Bruce Hammond]

I was flying my Phantom 3 Standard on a 1.5 mile long Litchi POI waypoint mission and accidentally touched the screen with my pinkie adding a last waypoint about a mile away. I didn't notice the waypoint until my drone flew off again instead of landing when the mission was supposed to be over. By the time I figured out why it flew off the drone was out of contact with my controller as the range is only about 800 feet because I live in a subdivision with a lot of homes, so I was unable to cancel the mission and return the drone to home. Instead I drove to where the map showed the last waypoint and was able to retrieve the drone undamaged from where it landed 20 feet up in a tree.

Read the narrative on the attached video for a more comprehensive story of how my drone ended up in a strange tree a mile from my home. I sped things up 10 times so the video is only 42 seconds long.

 

[tevek]

Glad you got it back, almost did a similar thing yesterday. I was about to load the mission and fly and noticed something strange, I had touched the screen when looking at another part of the map and had added another way point without realising it. Almost sent the drone to India. Lesson learnt. Check, check and check it again.

 

[rumrunner]

yeah, i really wish after a route is saved and loaded that it took a confirmation or something to alter it. I've inadvertently added waypoints as well but have been lucky enough not to fly off with one yet.


Sent from my iPad using PhantomPilots

 

[tevek]

yeah, i really wish after a route is saved and loaded that it took a confirmation or something to alter it. I've inadvertently added waypoints as well but have been lucky enough not to fly off with one yet.


Sent from my iPad using PhantomPilots

Agree, I usually check out the flight distance and duration at the bottom of the screen when it is ready to load and would have noticed it straight away, talking to the wife and flying drones are not compatible.

 

[Bruce Hammond]

Agree, I usually check out the flight distance and duration at the bottom of the screen when it is ready to load and would have noticed it straight away, talking to the wife and flying drones are not compatible.

Yes, I have altered my process before flying now. I had been refining the mission for a couple days so I had flown it several times and became complacent in some regards because all the risky stuff had been worked out. Now I always double check the waypoint path before flying.

 

[WilliamM]

They need to have a lock switch (on by default) on the screen that needs to be unlocked before a change can be made.