Can I fly over Water

mick · Jun 10, 2015

Hi, ive seen some posts about it being a bit dodgy flying over water, is this right as I would like to video our local river and fishing lake.

bbfpv · Jun 10, 2015

Of course you can fly over water, at the risk of completely losing your bird if you do something stupid. Nothing different than flying over land otherwise.

Edit: Unless you're talking about flying over water at very low altitudes with VPS enabled... which is pretty much a no-no.

Meta4 · Jun 10, 2015

Does a bird ask if it can fly over water?
Your Phantom only knows it has air beneath its props and doesn't care what's further down .. whether it's water or solid ground.
Offshore there are no trees to crash into.

mad in nc · Jun 10, 2015

Nice Pics Meta4.

They crash in water just like on land- just harder to retrieve..........

tcope · Jun 10, 2015

Flying over the water is perfectly fine. Flying _in_ the water is not.

DrChris · Jun 10, 2015

mad in nc said:
Nice Pics Meta4.

They crash in water just like on land- just harder to retrieve..........

Exactly my thought when I decided to venture out over water the first time. If it crashes from 100-400 feet it really doesn't matter if its over land or water except that I am more likely to find it if its over land. Still, the Phantom would be toast either way. As some have found, if it crashes and you recover it you MAY be able to show that it was a phantom error rather than user error and get some level of compensation back from DJI. The reality is that it's just a very very sad day if you crash either on land or water.

Some have put float devices on their phantoms to help them recover in case of a water crash. When I fly over water it is over the Mississippi river in a spot with 8 knot currents so even float devices don't really help me. If it goes for a swim, it's lost.

So, fly responsibly and carefully but enjoy wherever you fly!

Chris

Meta4 · Jun 10, 2015

Falling out of the sky is a rare occurrence.
Crashing into a tree or building is much less so.

MystryBox · Jun 10, 2015

How ya gonna get a Miami Vice title shot if you don't?

Vtecturtle · Jun 10, 2015

Electronics will be electronics. Anything can happen at anytime. Just hope for the best every flight and be thankful after every flight.

With that said, it kept up with my cruise ship in the middle of no where and flew just fine in Mexico 1500 ft over water.

ImageUploadedByPhantomPilots1433948791.477647.jpg

ImageUploadedByPhantomPilots1433948818.543471.jpg

mmjax · Jun 10, 2015

Vtecturtle said:
Electronics will be electronics. Anything can happen at anytime. Just hope for the best every flight and be thankful after every flight.

With that said, it kept up with my cruise ship in the middle of no where and flew just fine in Mexico 1500 ft over water. View attachment 21616 View attachment 21617

Vtecturtle - did you take off from, and land onto the ship while it was under way? Where abouts on the ship did you do this from? It wasn't too gusty, and the crew / passengers didn't have a problem with you doing this? I assume you hand caught it while under partial throttle? Need details!

I wouldn't mind bringing my Phantom along for my Thanksgiving cruise with NCL!

davemex · Jun 10, 2015

To some of the other points here, if you don't fly over water, how else can you chase your friends on kayaks over a coral reef?

Yeah, it's just as safe as land since it's toast either way if it crashes.

(also, nice cruise shots Vtecturtle)

Vtecturtle · Jun 10, 2015

mmjax said:
Vtecturtle - did you take off from, and land onto the ship while it was under way? Where abouts on the ship did you do this from? It wasn't too gusty, and the crew / passengers didn't have a problem with you doing this? I assume you hand caught it while under partial throttle? Need details!
I wouldn't mind bringing my Phantom along for my Thanksgiving cruise with NCL!

I took off from a top deck. Had calibration errors then I calibrated it over my head and took off by hand and hand caught it. No compass issues at all after calibration. It wasn't too windy that day. It was pretty rock solid and stable. Crew and guest were very interested in it and a few approached with questions but no bad attention. I didn't really fly over the boat as well. Took one pass over it but mainly away from it taking pictures. It took a lot of balls to do. Especially with the home point being farther away every second lol. I didn't do it until our way home, made sure I caught epic footage at all our stops first. This was either a fair well flight or more epicness lol. As you can see, more epicness lol.

Elesser · Jun 10, 2015

Meta4 said:
Does a bird ask if it can fly over water?
Your Phantom only knows it has air beneath its props and doesn't care what's further down .. whether it's water or solid ground.
Offshore there are no trees to crash into.

Those pics are taken with the p3 camera??
I got mine last week, just a few flights for now (first time ever with a drone) but i cant find the pics settings (like time lapse, shuttering etc) , just the exposition with the RC....

Fanti · Jun 10, 2015

Sure you can, 4 miles out and back, no prob...

landmannnn · Jun 10, 2015

Vtecturtle said:
I took off from a top deck. Had calibration errors then I calibrated it over my head and took off by hand and hand caught it. No compass issues at all after calibration. It wasn't too windy that day. It was pretty rock solid and stable. Crew and guest were very interested in it and a few approached with questions but no bad attention. I didn't really fly over the boat as well. Took one pass over it but mainly away from it taking pictures. It took a lot of balls to do. Especially with the home point being farther away every second lol. I didn't do it until our way home, made sure I caught epic footage at all our stops first. This was either a fair well flight or more epicness lol. As you can see, more epicness lol.

Not sure I would have the courage to do that!