Jason McNeil Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 I wanted to take advantage of the few days I'm in London to get some drone footage of flying the Mavic low level along the Thames following me on the Wheel. Duly set an alarm for the crack of dawn this morning to catch the right lighting conditions & reduce the chances of being challenged ... Little did I know that today of all mornings, was the annual London Marathon, undeterred I set off to South Bank. The first sequence went off without a hitch, there was some messing about with getting the right positioning, but I got a couple minutes of usable footage. Continued Westwards upriver for about 1 mile. Did the usual preflight checks, everything looked fine, & took off. Within 10 seconds of launching, the software came back with a 'Compass Error' message & the drone started veering off to port (left). Controls responsiveness was pretty minimal, & the situation deteriorated very quickly, to the point where my only concern was to ditch it as quick as possible with a reasonable probability of recovery (you can see the perspective of the done below). Has anyone else encountered this dreaded Compass Error before? It's particularly disconcerting when the sensors are functional on the ground but go haywire while up in the air. I've done about 120 flights with this drone before, it's the first malfunction of this type. Considering the location & the severity of the crash, with three broken props, the Mavic came out of the crash relatively unscathed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rehab1 Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 Sorry buddy! I feel your pain. At least you did capture some nice footage of you traveling over the bridge. Where you prompted to recalibrate the compass prior to take off? Did you get the green ‘GPS ready to go’ before launch? Metallic structures play havoc with the compass. Even some commercial concrete surfaces have so much rebarb mesh encassed in them that it affects the compass calibration. I see there were metal railings surrounding your takeoff zone. That could have been the issue. I think once you put it back together you will be fine. The break away props are an easy fix. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abinder3 Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 When I had my typhoon H, I always calibrated the compass before the first flight of the day and made sure I wasn’t near metallic objects when doing it. As Rehab1 stated, being near a metallic object can create problems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
abinder3 Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 Also, did you try to do a ‘return to home’ when it started acting strange? That may of helped by popping the Mavic up in the air higher and possibility away from something around there that was causing interference. (Just a thought.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marty Backe Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 Cool bridge riding shot (and looks like a great bridge to ride). Fortunately the drone lost it's mind over land. When these things happen, must make you paranoid to use a drone near people. At least it would with me. Make sure you carry good liability insurance Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jrkline "Wheel Whisperer" Posted March 4, 2018 Share Posted March 4, 2018 Damn Chinese drones.But at least it didn't end up in the drink! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Keith Posted March 5, 2018 Share Posted March 5, 2018 On 04/03/2018 at 10:18 AM, Jason McNeil said: Has anyone else encountered this dreaded Compass Error before? Like others have said metal or live electrical wiring can very much upset a compass. Quite a lot of the Thames has (or had - it’s been a while) daisy chain lighting along the river between the lampposts that might well be quite upsetting to a compass, but I couldn’t see any in the stretch you were flying along? You were very lucky that the tide was out at the time! 22 hours ago, Marty Backe said: Cool bridge riding shot (and looks like a great bridge to ride). Fortunately the drone lost it's mind over land. When these things happen, must make you paranoid to use a drone near people. At least it would with me. Make sure you carry good liability insurance The bridge is the so called wobbly bridge (actually Millennium Bridge - it had to be closed for a quite a time as soon as it opened due to swaying alarmingly when lots of people walked on it ) between St Paul’s Cathedral and Tate Modern (a disused power station) I worked for years in the red brick building behind it in the shot (Broken Wharf House). British law forbids the use of drones within 50M of buildings or people not under the control of the operator - strangely enough it is putting a camera on it that makes it apparently dangerous, a model plane only becomes restricted to the same level when it weighs more than 7kg (15lb). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smoother Posted March 6, 2018 Share Posted March 6, 2018 17 hours ago, Keith said: British law forbids the use of drones within 50M of buildings or people not under the control of the operator - strangely enough it is putting a camera on it that makes it apparently dangerous, a model plane only becomes restricted to the same level when it weighs more than 7kg (15lb). Maybe, it's privacy rights associated WITH the camera that generates the stricter rule. After all, would you like your female partner to be surprised in the bath, by a drone 2 feet outside the window? or sunbathing nude in her secluded backyard only to have a camera drone pop up over the hedge? You would worry for years who has the footage and if it will end up on the internet, not to mention blackmail potential. A woman in Italy committed suicide after she failed repeatedly to get secretly filmed footage of herself during sex, removed from the internet. It's very serious. Just my thoughts. @Jason McNeil a pity about the fog. I was driving to Gatwick about the same time. Hours later it was bright sunshine. No, I didn't know about the marathon either, doh! What's with all the hard breaking? From that distance, you looked like 2 out of three stick figures on a King Song pedal warning sticker. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vik's Posted March 8, 2018 Share Posted March 8, 2018 On 04.03.2018 at 11:18 AM, Jason McNeil said: ... Has anyone else encountered this dreaded Compass Error before? It's particularly disconcerting when the sensors are functional on the ground but go haywire while up in the air. I've done about 120 flights with this drone before, it's the first malfunction of this type. ... Sorry to hear about the incident. I've been very near the same situation once flying over the water... That damned "Compass Error" came up and even video stream got corny and pixelated because of the mobile mast interference. But luckily I could hit the "home" button just in time for Mavic to return to me so I could catch it by hand. I've tried to recalibrate compass right afterwards to no avail... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
novazeus Posted March 9, 2018 Share Posted March 9, 2018 waiting to hear if compass was calibrated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vik's Posted March 9, 2018 Share Posted March 9, 2018 4 hours ago, novazeus said: waiting to hear if compass was calibrated. In my case the compass went back to normal once I started the Mavic up from another place, far away from the problem area. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jason McNeil Posted March 9, 2018 Author Share Posted March 9, 2018 On 3/8/2018 at 4:06 AM, Vik's said: But luckily I could hit the "home" button just in time for Mavic to return to me so I could catch it by hand If the Compass is haywire, would the Mavic be to able to RTH? In the split-second I had to make a decision about what to do, ditching seemed to be the lowest risk outcome. The thought occurred to increase altitude to see if it would self-correct, but I wouldn't want a wayward drone streaking across the skies in central London, even if it was a Sunday morning at 7am. On 3/5/2018 at 7:12 AM, Keith said: British law forbids the use of drones within 50M of buildings What a great country it is that reflexive bans any new technology simply because it is new Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vik's Posted March 9, 2018 Share Posted March 9, 2018 12 minutes ago, Jason McNeil said: If the Compass is haywire, would the Mavic be to able to RTH? In the split-second I had to make a decision about what to do, ditching seemed to be the lowest risk outcome. The thought occurred to increase altitude to see if it would self-correct, but I wouldn't want a wayward drone streaking across the skies in central London, even if it was a Sunday morning at 7am. Yeah, in your situation - you did the right thing. Guess I just got lucky and the interference was not as critical as on your mavic. And in my case the only risk would be the drone loss and no damage to other people or their property since the area was quite large and open. So I took the chance to try RTH and it went well... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stan Onymous Posted March 10, 2018 Share Posted March 10, 2018 On March 8, 2018 at 4:06 AM, Vik's said: luckily I could hit the "home" button just in time for Mavic to return to me so I could catch it by hand. Careful, thats how Enrique Iglesias cut up his hand on stage. He reached out to grab a drone and it cut his finger. How do I know this? Good question, my Tow Truck driver told me that story. He even asked me if I knew of him, so I am pretty sure he wasnt trying to impress me. But still, careful grabbing those things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vik's Posted March 10, 2018 Share Posted March 10, 2018 6 hours ago, Stan Onymous said: Careful, thats how Enrique Iglesias cut up his hand on stage. He reached out to grab a drone and it cut his finger. How do I know this? Good question, my Tow Truck driver told me that story. He even asked me if I knew of him, so I am pretty sure he wasnt trying to impress me. But still, careful grabbing those things. Yes, I heard that story about Iglesias slicing his fingers by trying to grab Inspire1 drone... Good thing, he said that it was a stupid thing to do himself, we'll give him that. Still, he's got some more fingers left (8 to 9 test tries ) I didn't try to sing and entertain all at the same time as catching my mavic, though I just paused it when it came close/low enough to me to safely hug the drone's belly. But yeah, it was my first time ever, never tried to do "palm landing" before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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