Hello Fellow Forum Members:
I signed up here just to share my story. I've logged about 100 hours of flight on my Phantom 3 Professional already, even created a Youtube Channel for it! Not for shameless self promotion, but I'd love some more subscribers!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiYMNvaWQj7cIpOY_HIIraA
Anyway, earlier this week I was with a friend of mine who was interested into getting into aerial video. So we were on a pedestrian bridge trying to get a shot out over the river. I remembered the manual, "DO NOT calibrate near bridges or cars." Ok. This bridge is solid metal and concrete and the path is about 10ft wide. The first two times, I get the "strong electromagnetic interference" warning. So I get to as close to the middle of the bridge as I can, successful! Everything is green, I do the preflight checks and show him the auto takeoff.
What happens next? The think takes off normally and suddenly cuts into a yaw, we both hit the deck to keep this **** thing from taking our heads off, it comes back around and continues to yaw, plows right into a bridge support and into the water. I stood there for a few moments not believing my eyes, having just told him how much this toy cost.
Well as a rescue diver for the county, what did I do? Apparently I was trying to focus but I yelled at him "HOLD MY ****!" and handed him all the items from my pockets, took off my snazzy Dansko dress shoes, and dove into the river. In total it was submerged about 4 minutes or so before I managed to find it. I don't carry swiftwater gear, and towards the end of the season it was moving pretty fast. When I picked it up out of the water, I heard the signature "DJI beep" but the battery was flashing red, so I pulled the battery out of the unit and powered it off.
I hucked it into the back of my pickup bed thinking it was just a fancy paperweight now. When I got home I took an air compressor and blew out everything I could. Then took an old Pelican case, dropped it in, and filled it with rice. Now two days later, I had to take the entire unit apart and shake the loose rice out, and to my surprise, both the battery pack and the unit powered on and passed all function and flight checks normally.
I haven't taken it back into the air yet but lesson learned. They are serious when they say the compass is an "extremely sensitive device" and they aren't kidding when it can be disrupted by metal objects. A bad calibration that wasn't flagged as an error is the only explanation I can provide. I'm still trying to extract the video of the crash, but otherwise that is my story!
Hopefully in my time here I'll get to read a few of yours and maybe get some comments about mine! Enjoy.
I signed up here just to share my story. I've logged about 100 hours of flight on my Phantom 3 Professional already, even created a Youtube Channel for it! Not for shameless self promotion, but I'd love some more subscribers!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiYMNvaWQj7cIpOY_HIIraA
Anyway, earlier this week I was with a friend of mine who was interested into getting into aerial video. So we were on a pedestrian bridge trying to get a shot out over the river. I remembered the manual, "DO NOT calibrate near bridges or cars." Ok. This bridge is solid metal and concrete and the path is about 10ft wide. The first two times, I get the "strong electromagnetic interference" warning. So I get to as close to the middle of the bridge as I can, successful! Everything is green, I do the preflight checks and show him the auto takeoff.
What happens next? The think takes off normally and suddenly cuts into a yaw, we both hit the deck to keep this **** thing from taking our heads off, it comes back around and continues to yaw, plows right into a bridge support and into the water. I stood there for a few moments not believing my eyes, having just told him how much this toy cost.
Well as a rescue diver for the county, what did I do? Apparently I was trying to focus but I yelled at him "HOLD MY ****!" and handed him all the items from my pockets, took off my snazzy Dansko dress shoes, and dove into the river. In total it was submerged about 4 minutes or so before I managed to find it. I don't carry swiftwater gear, and towards the end of the season it was moving pretty fast. When I picked it up out of the water, I heard the signature "DJI beep" but the battery was flashing red, so I pulled the battery out of the unit and powered it off.
I hucked it into the back of my pickup bed thinking it was just a fancy paperweight now. When I got home I took an air compressor and blew out everything I could. Then took an old Pelican case, dropped it in, and filled it with rice. Now two days later, I had to take the entire unit apart and shake the loose rice out, and to my surprise, both the battery pack and the unit powered on and passed all function and flight checks normally.
I haven't taken it back into the air yet but lesson learned. They are serious when they say the compass is an "extremely sensitive device" and they aren't kidding when it can be disrupted by metal objects. A bad calibration that wasn't flagged as an error is the only explanation I can provide. I'm still trying to extract the video of the crash, but otherwise that is my story!
Hopefully in my time here I'll get to read a few of yours and maybe get some comments about mine! Enjoy.
