What's the stickiest situation you've been in? +new video

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I went out this morning to try and film the sunrise, it didn't go to plan as it was too foggy!

My phone battery died while I was still in the air :confounded: luckily I was directly overhead so I could land without using the DJI app.

Has anyone else had any something like this happen to you? What's your worst moment of panic when you've been flying?

 
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Last year I was flying and the battery fell to 20% and it was LOS so I decided to bring it back. As it came back it was about 30 metres ahead of me and was about to land.

It's was night outside so I couldn't see where it would land. I tried to fly it back manually without looking at the screen and just look at the bird.

Stupidly I should have been watching the directional arrow on the app but I didn't.

At that moment the RTH kicked in, but it was set to raise to 500M. sure enough I panicked and cancelled and then it happened. The bird was auto landing behind the trees. By now it was a good 100M away.

If only I looked at the arrow on the app to guide it in rather then looking at the actual bird. It was night after all.

Needless to say I spent 3 solid hours looking for it. Went home had a cuppa and tried again. Still no luck.

Didn't sleep at all, then 5am came and I thought "people will be leaving for work, school kids will be leaving for school soon enough"

Thats when I thought I will try one more time. And straight away I found it. There it was on the floor. I looked at the SD card and it was recorded landing in someones garden.

They took it out side as soon as it landed and I didn't see it as I was checking the driveways and it was buried under some leaves.

Apparently the guy took it outside and brang it in again as hes wife remembered seeing my phone number. But I took it 15 mins after he left it outside.

Needles to say I got the bird back and hes family got a very nice bottle of champagne for their honesty in letting me get the bird back.

I then sent the bird back to the on-line shop (worried for any water damage) and got an exchange lol

But now... I always return the bird back at 30% battery and fly it no more then 40M in front of me until it hits 20%

Neon Euc
 
Last year I was flying and the battery fell to 20% and it was LOS so I decided to bring it back. As it came back it was about 30 metres ahead of me and was about to land.

It's was night outside so I couldn't see where it would land. I tried to fly it back manually without looking at the screen and just look at the bird.

Stupidly I should have been watching the directional arrow on the app but I didn't.

At that moment the RTH kicked in, but it was set to raise to 500M. sure enough I panicked and cancelled and then it happened. The bird was auto landing behind the trees. By now it was a good 100M away.

If only I looked at the arrow on the app to guide it in rather then looking at the actual bird. It was night after all.

Needless to say I spent 3 solid hours looking for it. Went home had a cuppa and tried again. Still no luck.

Didn't sleep at all, then 5am came and I thought "people will be leaving for work, school kids will be leaving for school soon enough"

Thats when I thought I will try one more time. And straight away I found it. There it was on the floor. I looked at the SD card and it was recorded landing in someones garden.

They took it out side as soon as it landed and I didn't see it as I was checking the driveways and it was buried under some leaves.

Apparently the guy took it outside and brang it in again as hes wife remembered seeing my phone number. But I took it 15 mins after he left it outside.

Needles to say I got the bird back and hes family got a very nice bottle of champagne for their honesty in letting me get the bird back.

I then sent the bird back to the on-line shop (worried for any water damage) and got an exchange lol

But now... I always return the bird back at 30% battery and fly it no more then 40M in front of me until it hits 20%

Neon Euc


RTH set at 500M altitude !!!!!!!!!!!! :)

The only thing you are going to hit up there is an oncoming aircraft.....:)
 
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RTH set at 500M altitude !!!!!!!!!!!! :)
Lol it was to stop it hitting any tall towers where I am. After that I flew next to the highest tower and it was 90 metres so I set my RTH at 100M lol

Neon Euc
 
That is crazy I imagine being so stressed out if that happened to me!
How did it start landing on its own? Because of low battery?
I had to use the arrow on the map today as I couldn't see it in the sky and could only see gray fog most of the time I was flying!!
 
That is crazy I imagine being so stressed out if that happened to me!
How did it start landing on its own? Because of low battery?
I had to use the arrow on the map today as I couldn't see it in the sky and could only see gray fog most of the time I was flying!!
Yeah when it finally hit 10% it started to land. Landed 2 streets away from me. But where I was it looked like it was going to land in the trees lol

Neon Euc
 
Mine involved a long, one way Litchi flight from my house to my son's place. Because of the length of the flight, I had to program it as a round trip even though I was pretty sure I didn't have enough battery for that (as a one way flight, it wouldn't load because the first and last waypoints were more than 2000 m apart). My plan was to launch the mission, then drive to his place, cancel the mission when I regained contact, and manually land it. I had carefully calculated elevations (over a few hills), flight speed/time and the time it would take me to drive there. I added a little safety buffer by having it programmed to circle his 25 acre hayfield before heading home just in case I was a little late arriving. All worked according to plan except the one thing I wasn't expecting. When I arrived, his gate was locked! Fortunately, after a minute or two of shakily searching for his hidden key (which he had moved from it's usual place!), I found it, opened the gate and drove to the back of the property where my Phantom appeared, coming over the treetops exactly as planned. I flipped from F mode to P mode, took control and landed without a hitch. Let's just say then when I found the locked gate (which normally would have been unlocked), the "pucker factor" went from 3 to 10 at supersonic speed. In the end (no pun intended), all went well.
 
Mine involved a long, one way Litchi flight from my house to my son's place. Because of the length of the flight, I had to program it as a round trip even though I was pretty sure I didn't have enough battery for that (as a one way flight, it wouldn't load because the first and last waypoints were more than 2000 m apart). My plan was to launch the mission, then drive to his place, cancel the mission when I regained contact, and manually land it. I had carefully calculated elevations (over a few hills), flight speed/time and the time it would take me to drive there. I added a little safety buffer by having it programmed to circle his 25 acre hayfield before heading home just in case I was a little late arriving. All worked according to plan except the one thing I wasn't expecting. When I arrived, his gate was locked! Fortunately, after a minute or two of shakily searching for his hidden key (which he had moved from it's usual place!), I found it, opened the gate and drove to the back of the property where my Phantom appeared, coming over the treetops exactly as planned. I flipped from F mode to P mode, took control and landed without a hitch. Let's just say then when I found the locked gate (which normally would have been unlocked), the "pucker factor" went from 3 to 10 at supersonic speed. In the end (no pun intended), all went well.

pharm that sounds risky! Clever to circle the field to give you extra time. What distance was it? Do you know where I can find more info in this litchy thing? I'm guessing it's software to tell the phantom where to go?
 
pharm that sounds risky! Clever to circle the field to give you extra time. What distance was it? Do you know where I can find more info in this litchy thing? I'm guessing it's software to tell the phantom where to go?
Litchi for DJI Mavic/Phantom/Inspire

Yes, it's main feature is to allow you to program a preset flight path using waypoints. Unlike DJI Go, you don't have to fly to each waypoint first before setting them. There are other features as well. Just make sure you download and read the manual. Go to Youtube and search for Litchi. A lot of good instructional videos there. You can download the app from the app store (ios) or Google Play (Android). I think it's around $25 now but in my opinion, well worth it.

Total distance was 2.1 miles as I recall. It's been awhile. Just had to test my limits a bit. ;)
 
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Litchi for DJI Mavic/Phantom/Inspire

Yes, it's main feature is to allow you to program a preset flight path using waypoints. Unlike DJI Go, you don't have to fly to each waypoint first before setting them. There are other features as well. Just make sure you download and read the manual. Go to Youtube and search for Litchi. A lot of good instructional videos there. You can download the app from the app store (ios) or Google Play (Android). I think it's around $25 now but in my opinion, well worth it.

Total distance was 2.1 miles as I recall. It's been awhile. Just had to test my limits a bit. ;)
Thanks for the info! I will definitely look into this. So it replaces the whole dji app?
 
Thanks for the info! I will definitely look into this. So it replaces the whole dji app?
For the most part, yes. There are a few things you need to set in DJI Go first. For instance, if you're going to fly a waypoint mission in Litchi, you need to enable "multiple flight modes" in DJI Go beforehand (make sure your AC is on and connected first so the setting will "stick"). After enabling, close Go before running Litchi. Don't have both apps running at the same time EVER. Whether flying manually or a waypoint mission, I rarely use Go anymore.
 
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I live at the beach and one of my very early flights was off the shore over the water. The low battery level alarm started sounding and I became anxious and jittery as I'd never gotten to this point before. I'd read everything I could before flying but hadn't experienced any issues firsthand and didn't know if I could trust RTH. When I was alerted to the critical battery level and informed that the bird was landing, I thought it was out over the water when, actually it was overhead. Geez. Somehow my wife and I just couldn't locate it in the air and I was too inexperienced to use the phone picture and map to steer her back. So I had that sick feeling in my gut and was sure it landed in the Gulf. But, low and behold, I looked at the phone and it showed a picture of our condo. We trailed it down about 90 feet behind us on the beach...10 feet from the water. Yikes and a number of lessons learned. Anyway, here's a picture I had the bird take of my wife and I after we found it.
 

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