Aborted flight due to birds... Anyone else?

J0ck0 · Jun 22, 2015

i was flying at Dinosaur Cave Park in Pismo Beach, CA a couple weeks ago. i had a Sea Gull chase my Phantom a couple times when i flew into a cove that he/she was in. i finally decided to land it due to the aggressiveness of the gull, and it dove at it as i was descending from about 15 feet off the ground in front of me. very scary moment and kept me from flying when the gulls were around from that point forward.

OGE · Jun 22, 2015

Had to bail due to trees...

louforgiveno · Jun 22, 2015

I was at the Warriors parade in Oakland, Ca and saw an P2 and an Inspire (both flying over the crowd of nearly 1 million people). Anyway in bad form the inspire pilot was flying within 20-30 meters from the main stage and suddenly a seagull started circling it. Circled it for about 1 minute then started a dive bombing gesture...Lucky for the pilot the bird eventually backed off....cause if that thing had got bumped out of the sky there was a 100% chance it would crash into a person.

Pic from minutes before seagull appeared

Coldfire · Jun 22, 2015

Bats seem to be attracted to the phantom at last light.

edonovanl · Jun 22, 2015

DrChris said:
I headed down to our riverfront today to try to shoot some video of one of the riverboat cruise ships leaving port. Unfortunately very soon after taking flight and turning upriver to cover the short distance from my home point to the dock area about 5 birds started circling my phantom and making rather aggressive moves toward it. I decided that it was more important not to have a bird hit a prop and down my phantom than to get the shots I wanted to get today. So, I turned and flew her home rather quickly. The birds followed most all of the way but turned back after I got down to about 15 feet altitude. My Phantom made it down to a safe hand-catch and I headed back inside.

Another possible evasive move would have been to fly out further over the river and approach the dock area from a different angle, but I didn't want to risk it with the way the birds were acting.

Anyone else with similar experiences?

Chris

Add a laser...

ianwood · Jun 22, 2015

The sparrows in SoCal really dislike Phantoms. They love to dive bomb at high speed. I haven't seen them make contact but they can get really close. Hawks also swoop in but appear more curious than threatened.

Ezookiel · Jul 21, 2015

Bloody things nearly caused me to abort a video shoot today. Thankfully after they swarmed around and chased me off the first time, they seemed happy with that, and never reappeared when I tentatively tried another go at getting the video I needed. In the end I used an entire 6000 mAh battery - about 17 minutes flight time with over 20% remaining, with not another peep from them.
But the funniest bit was flying backwards away from them I could see them all in pursuit, attacking EACH OTHER to get the best pursuit position. LOL. An army divided against itself can't stand. Maybe that's why they never reappeared when I tried again, they were still too busy fighting each other for the right to go attack me.

kyba274 · Jul 21, 2015

Yep I've had a magpie dive bomb my phantom at the local park on my first flight. I saw something white fly towards the phantom from the magpie and then later found some bird poop on the quad.
Also more recently had about 5 of them start circling above my quad so I brought it down straight away. I ain't gonna infringe their airspace.

mjrii87 · Oct 28, 2015

Hey guys I am new here... I have been flying smaller aircraft since I was a kid but got into quads about a year ago (big ones) with a v303 and now using a Phantom 3. I usually fly in the cities here in South Korea and Japan but went for a bit of an outdoorsy adventure this past week. A large rescue helicopter was flying and a lot of birds (crows?) started to fly but never attacked it. After the helicopter left I took off to get my shots. Well 3-6 birds started to chase/follow my drone. (Yes I call it a drone it can fly itself and land itself I don't want to argue it, in Korea and Japan they are legally called drones) I was really nervous never having had anything this close but i just stayed the course and at mark 12:30 you can see that one of them really just came up along side me and was kind of chilling out. No attacks at all. I feel lucky but was extremely nervous. Is this pretty normal behavior are the birds just curious what it is? Why did they not do the same for the rescue helicopter? I am not a bird expert so figure I would ask.

Chad Nuttall · Oct 28, 2015

I've aborted when a couple bald eagles came into the area. They would take out the phantom easy...

eyecon82 · Oct 28, 2015

You mostly have to be careful around nesting season

Sent from my XT1575 using Tapatalk

CONTROL FREQ · Oct 28, 2015

Just last week a flock of about 20 birds swarmed around my Phantom. This has happened many times where birds swarmed around it and quickly backed off but on this day, this flock didn't back off! They circled around it and when I tried going up, they were like a magnet going up with it! When I tried to go down, they were right on it! After about 45 seconds of this choreographed sky dance, I started bringing it down towards me and they then backed off so I flew low for a minute in another direction and they flew away so I continued my flight while keeping a cautious eye open for them.

I read somewhere that some territorial birds of prey tends to attack our phantoms and bring it down so be careful!

Chris Vedeler · Oct 28, 2015

I aborted a flight a few months ago due to aggressive hawks. I caught one come right at me. I did full up and I think the sound scared him to change course. I got out of there right away.