I was flying a progress flight plan this morning with a DJI Phantom 4 Advanced. About 75% into the mission, the drone left the mission plan, flew 1500 to 2000 feet off mission past the home point, lost signal, never reconnected and landed itself in a random field. Luckily, after 30 minutes of searching, I found it, but very disheartening…scared to try it again out of fear I may not be so lucky next time. Attached is a screen shot from my phone after the drone went off course.
I saw this post dated yesterday and was wondering if the first time I’ve experienced a flight anomaly just coincidentally occurred on the same date as @bstro, or if there might be a link.
The flight occurred on a breezy morning and what had been flight planned as a 1-battery mission was already into its 2nd battery due to very slow progression on the upwind legs. In fact, at 3 points the aircraft ground to a halt and then backed up momentarily. (See blue circles in image below.)
Initially I wrote this movement off to wind gusts.
Then, at the point where the drone should have made a right turn (blue arrow, 2nd image) and begun its 3rd upwind leg, it instead turned left (yellow arrow, 2nd image) and departed from the flight plan. At this point I aborted the mission and successfully ordered the aircraft to return to the Home Point.
I would be happy to forward the flight log too, if you feel that appropriate.
Thanks!
PS, Sorry about the double post; I wasn’t aware Newbies were limited to one image per post.
Thanks for reaching out regarding my flight experience on the 29th.
I would be happy to forward the logs for the flights in question if you could let me know which log(s) would be most useful (NoCloud - DroneDeployLogs, FSMissions, and/or MissionRecords) -or- (SDK_logs - FlightRecord).
There were no power lines or equipment in the area of the flight. However, there was a large building nearby. The compass showed Normal during the DJI Go 4 app pre-launch check and was, therefor, not calibrated. And the DJI app was shut down before the DroneDeploy app was launched and flight initiated.
FYI, I flew a test mission yesterday at a different location and lower altitude (to facilitate tightening the geofence/altitude limits), and experienced no anomalies. And today (with winds aloft much lighter than those experienced on the 29th) I completed the original flight plan (1/2 battery), then flew a second version of the same flight plan - this time with the course running 90 degrees to the original (2 batteries) - again no departures from the flight plan.
Thanks for sharing and running a couple test missions at different locations. Based on your description, it seems the flight anomaly you experienced previously was site-specific. It’s likely there was some environmental interference that cause your drone to fly off course. If you’d still like us to investigate, feel free to send me your flight log as a .txt file using these instructions.
We’re glad to hear that your two most recent missions went smoothly!
I’m not seeing the .txt files attached. Do you mind sending it in a direct message to me? I’d be happy to take a look on Monday when I’m back in the office.
By direct message did you mean via something other than the message option on your forum.dronedeploy.com page? (I tried sending the .txt files by that message option and got a popup saying that .txt files were not a permitted format for attachments.)
Anyway, next week would be fine (if I can get the files to you by then.)
I had a similar scary loss of control yesterday. My PP4 left a Progress flight plan at about 11 of 16 waypoints and headed home. Above home it decided to leave, initially in a zig-zag pattern. I was not able to regain control of the drone for several minutes. Eventually got it back but it was a very concerning episode. How can I provide you with logs as the flight logs don’t see to me available. I fly using a iPad Pro and have synced since the flight in question, but cannot access any flight logs
I’m sorry to hear you experienced a concerning episode. As I mentioned previously in this thread, flying near power lines or in close proximity to metal equipment can interfere with the drone’s telemetry. Did you make sure to calibrate your compass prior to the mission?
Please do see our guide on Gathering Flight Logs for instructions to download your logs directly from DroneDeploy.
I am also sharing the link to a short video on how to find the mobile logs on your drone through iTunes if you were using an iOS device (in case the flight logs are not available in DroneDeploy).
Please take a look and see if there are any logs from your most recent flight - if so, these could be uploaded to AirData or any other free flight log viewer to give you a better idea of what happened and the health of your drone during the mission. I hope this helps!
I was flying a progress flight plan this morning with a DJI Phantom 4 Advanced. About 75% into the mission, the drone left the mission plan, flew 1500 to 2000 feet off mission past the home point, lost signal, never reconnected and landed itself in a random field. Luckily, after 30 minutes of searching, I found it, but very disheartening…scared to try it again out of fear I may not be so lucky next time. Attached is a screen shot from my phone after the drone went off course.
