Stupid Drone crash

Here's what I've learned: When the controller announces the aircraft will land in 10 seconds and you are over a big pine tree, you are probably screwed.
If you have a little time left in the battery and you think you can make another round--forget about it.
It's not that easy to pilot when the drone is hidden behind a tree and the autopilot failsafe is trying to bring it straight down.
The return to home feature can become problematic when your takeoff point is under the roof on the patio. And even that's not bad if you don't wait till the battery level is critical to land it. Panic does not help!
The good news is it landed upside down and was not damaged at all.

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Thanks for sharing. Did you consider switching to ATTI mode and gaining altitude or did you panic? I'm sure you were relieved when you found your camera and gimbal intact! Thanks for the tips!
 
I actually have read the manuals extensively and follow all the threads.
VPS would not be appropriate on my covered deck because It's 15' above the ground. I imagine it would blast into the ceiling when coming in across the grass below. I do acquire 13 sats before taking off however. It's never been a problem for the P3.
I had just finished a long waypoint mission 500m out and around and thought I would finish off the battery before landing. Well I almost finished the P3 instead!
Thanks for your advice - I have learned a lot from this blunder.

So then you're not having any trouble getting enough satellites for a green gps signal.
 
Thanks for sharing. Did you consider switching to ATTI mode and gaining altitude or did you panic? I'm sure you were relieved when you found your camera and gimbal intact! Thanks for the tips!
I don't think ATTI would matter with battery reporting critical. It just wants to go straight down and land. Which it did--more or less.
 
No problem at all getting sats from my upper deck. 11+ right away.

Well then, other then wind gust blowing around the upper deck I would see an issue using it as home point. That is unless you fly into a low battery situation. lol! :D
 
Well then, other then wind gust blowing around the upper deck I would see an issue using it as home point. That is unless you fly into a low battery situation. lol! :D
You are right. There is a risk using the covered deck as a home point, but it can be mostly mitigated with better planning. I normally cancel RTH before the P3 stops above the roof and starts its descent. This time I really screwed up.
Another contributor noted that he often does similar take offs, but he then resets his Home Point (while in flight) when he is clear of obstacles such as roofs and trees. That seems smart.
 
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Thanks for sharing your adventure, glad it finished ok, I have a phantom 2 vision and have just bought a phantom 3 (second hand) just need to take a mortgage out to buy a second battery ? so far in fathoms ( sorry was in the Royal navy) Phantoms, been lucky like you , hit a tree when doing a compass jig (under a tree) with my first FC40, camera one way, phantom stuck in the tree , and at 68yrs then its a long time since climbing up tree's, but the fc40 was fine, so there is a lot of us out here done similar things, but we learn don't we, cheers from UK. TB
 
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I take off from my deck which is shaded by large trees. I just happened to think about the problem it would be if I were not able to take control if it went into RTH. It would try to land in my trees. To avoid this, I always fly it out into a clear spot out in the yard, hover and reset my HOME location. It only takes a couple of seconds. In theory, I could hit the RTH button and go in the house, get a beer and come back to a safe Phantom.

I just want to thank you for suggesting I should reset my home point after takeoff. I have tried resetting it before (not for this reason) and it was unsuccessful. I may have been too close to the original home point, but it works great now. Just tap the little (H) marker on the left of the iOS screen and select the aircraft to reset. I feel a lot better about covered deck takeoffs now.
 
I am glad your MR is fine. This is how you learn.

It is fine to fly under roofs or in dense forrest. Just remember you are on your own, like with any traditional RC aircraft. In those conditions I fly in atti only and never take my eye of the MR. It is fun to fly down a forest path or follow a stream with overhanging branches, I have even flown around a waterfall where I had to take off and land on a boardwalk under a dense canopy with less than a foot to spare flying out and returning, this was in a F450, no problem, just concentrate hard and shoot by feel. Or have someone else give verbal gimbal movement instructions. It is fun and rewarding.

Also to me I trust time as much as the telemetry in the app. 14 minutes is always safe with a fully charged battery. So after 12 minutes I like to be in close. I have over 40 RC aircraft and I always use time as my primary indicator of when to land. I have never had a crash in any of them from low battery. Conservative is good. And I never fly out of visual range. Shooting video or stills I always have a spotter if I have to look at the screen.

For solo complex shooting I like the different auto pilot Apps. This way I can keep an eye on the MR while the flying and camera work is automatic. If I don't like the look of things I just take over.

The Auto Return to Home is nice, but I never count on it, too many things can, and will go wrong sometime.
Sorry if this is basic, but what does "MR" mean? I assume the aircraft, but most here don't use the term MR that I have seen yet. Thanks
 
A lot of us "old timers" call Multi Rotors MRs.

It is an aviation term.

Fixed wing is a normal airplane with propellers or jet engines (mostly turbo fans these days). Helicopters can be single rotor or multi rotor. There are also tilt wing aircraft like the osprey. All these aircraft have model versions as well, so technically we fly RC (radio control) multi rotor models.

Drones have a scary military concentration, so I try not to use that term.
 
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The thread title is a bit misleading - I think the word pilot needs to be inserted after the 2nd word :p
Can't disagree, but it was a learning experience and thanks to one poster with a great solution, a situation that will not recur. Others recommended I not takeoff from under a covered deck, but by simply resetting my home point after clearing the deck, the problem was solved.
 
Dounin Font do you know that you can set a new home point mid flight? (Apologies if you do)
 
Here's what I've learned: When the controller announces the aircraft will land in 10 seconds and you are over a big pine tree, you are probably screwed.
If you have a little time left in the battery and you think you can make another round--forget about it.
It's not that easy to pilot when the drone is hidden behind a tree and the autopilot failsafe is trying to bring it straight down.
The return to home feature can become problematic when your takeoff point is under the roof on the patio. And even that's not bad if you don't wait till the battery level is critical to land it. Panic does not help!
The good news is it landed upside down and was not damaged at all.

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Same happened to me..
 
Same happened to me..

My 2 biggest takeaways from this experience have been:
  1. Do not try to run out the clock on your battery. Allow plenty of reserve time.
  2. Since your takeoff point and landing point may have different criteria, use the reset home point feature to update it in the air. That alone would have solved my initial problem.
 
Here's what I've learned: When the controller announces the aircraft will land in 10 seconds and you are over a big pine tree, you are probably screwed.
If you have a little time left in the battery and you think you can make another round--forget about it.
It's not that easy to pilot when the drone is hidden behind a tree and the autopilot failsafe is trying to bring it straight down.
The return to home feature can become problematic when your takeoff point is under the roof on the patio. And even that's not bad if you don't wait till the battery level is critical to land it. Panic does not help!
The good news is it landed upside down and was not damaged at all.

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An awesome bungle with great footage. LOL That's how we learn from each other.
 
Here's what I've learned: When the controller announces the aircraft will land in 10 seconds and you are over a big pine tree, you are probably screwed.
If you have a little time left in the battery and you think you can make another round--forget about it.
It's not that easy to pilot when the drone is hidden behind a tree and the autopilot failsafe is trying to bring it straight down.
The return to home feature can become problematic when your takeoff point is under the roof on the patio. And even that's not bad if you don't wait till the battery level is critical to land it. Panic does not help!
The good news is it landed upside down and was not damaged at all.

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My two crashes were inside my outbuilding and running into my wifes new truck. I have Macular degeneration in one eye and depth perception is a problem. LOL
Luckily no damage done.
 
My 2 biggest takeaways from this experience have been:
  1. Do not try to run out the clock on your battery. Allow plenty of reserve time.
  2. Since your takeoff point and landing point may have different criteria, use the reset home point feature to update it in the air. That alone would have solved my initial problem.
Sometimes the override from auto can be a bit sluggish on auto-land.Ya just gotta pray.
 

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