Crash of Inspire Pro in Palouse, Washington State

[Thomas Kong]

Hello

I purchased Phantom 4 on July 12th.

After using Phantom 4 for a week, I got fascinated by the stability and quality of shots.

So I decided to add Inspire Pro and ordered one on July 27th and got delivered on Aug 5th.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/22219381 ... =STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

I enjoy swapping the lenses using Inspire Pro with 12mm, 15mm, 25mm, 45mm lenses.

I am on more photographer side than videographer.


I brought my Phantom 4 and Inspire Pro to Steptoe Butte in Palouse, Washington State and took nice pictures on Aug 13th.

I use my Phantom 4 for wide shot and Inspire Pro for telephoto using 45mm F1.8 Olympus lens.

I had been back to that place 3 times more with my drones.

I had flown Inspire Pro up to 400ft(120m) up there and rotate all around without moving.



On Aug 27th, I had been back to Steptoe for 4th time.

There has been somewhat strong wind around 20mile hr.

This time I had been more careful to fly up to only 60ft up there and took some pictures for 9 minutes with no problem.





Then I switched to video mode and started taking video around.

Around 2 minutes of passing, it drifted to north side by 300ft although I did not touch right side stick to move around.

With 35% of battery remaining, I touched RTH comand but the inspire was not coming back to home position properly.

Thus I cancelled the RTH Comand and had tried to maneuver home manually.

But it had kept drifting and ran out of battery and crashed into the woods.



I recovered the drone using GPS coordinate without much difficulty.

The landing gear got a lot of damage and one propeller got broken.

But amazingly, main controller including GPS, gimball with camera and 4 motors seems to be working fine even after the crash.

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If you go to above link, you can watch the unedited video showing the course of crash.

It may have touched the fine tree and fell under one side.

I also attach the flight record.



My first question is why Inspire Pro had drifted around 100ft although I had not touched right side stick at all.

The second quesion is why RTH command does not work properly.

There had been somewhat strong wind, but if you watch Youtube video, the wind had not been that extreme.





I would like to get your opinion whether the repair shall be covered by DJI warranty.




I had enjoyed the quality of picture using Phantom 4 and Inspire Pro so far, but I will be more cautious in flying them around after this incident.

thanks in advance

Thomas

 

[SanCap]

Are those Microwave antennas? Can they affect the Inspire 1 signal?

 

[Thomas Kong]

Are those Microwave antennas? Can they affect the Inspire 1 signal?

Could be.

But it worked fine in 3 previous flight at higher altitude of 400ft.

 

[DesertWindAero]

The flight record indicates your average wind speed on that flight was 31.2 MPH, with a max gust of 37.8 -- way beyond limits.

Your air time was 17 minutes and 5 seconds...you should have gotten warnings about low power, the default is when you are at 30%, yet when it went down, you were at 1%.

At 12 minutes 46 seconds, you initiated Go Home -- but there may not have been enough juice.

You had excellent GPS reception throughout the flight.

There were no compass issues.

Your Signal Strength Score was 100%.

From the Google Earth track, looks like you had a very erratic flight, which probably drained the battery quickly. Also, you probably could not see the aircraft when it got to Position 16 on the photo as it was 85 feet below your takeoff point.

 

[SanCap]

Could be.

But it worked fine in 3 previous flight at higher altitude of 400ft.

400 feet would of had you cleared from the transmission from the antennas, but as desert denizen says you didn't have an compass errors.

 

[Thomas Kong]

The flight record indicates your average wind speed on that flight was 31.2 MPH, with a max gust of 37.8 -- way beyond limits.

Your air time was 17 minutes and 5 seconds...you should have gotten warnings about low power, the default is when you are at 30%, yet when it went down, you were at 1%.

At 12 minutes 46 seconds, you initiated Go Home -- but there may not have been enough juice.

You had excellent GPS reception throughout the flight.

There were no compass issues.

Your Signal Strength Score was 100%.

From the Google Earth track, looks like you had a very erratic flight, which probably drained the battery quickly. Also, you probably could not see the aircraft when it got to Position 16 on the photo as it was 85 feet below your takeoff point.

Thanks for your detailed analysis.

The wind gust may have been stronger than I had thought.

That is the reason why I had it up only to 30 ft.

When I initiated the RTH on 12min and 46 seconds. the remaining battery was 35 percent that should be enough to come back home which is just 600 ft away.

The flight had lasted 4 more minutes.

 

[DesertWindAero]

Thanks for your detailed analysis.

The wind gust may have been stronger than I had thought.

That is the reason why I had it up only to 30 ft.

When I initiated the RTH on 12min and 46 seconds. the remaining battery was 35 percent that should be enough to come back home which is just 600 ft away.

The flight had lasted 4 more minutes.

Your max altitude was 110 feet.

 

[IrishSights]

Agree with @DesertDenizen. The RTH engaged but not just enough power to beat the wind. 9mph over its limit not including gusts - which would then put it at 16mph over its maximum wind speed resistance of 22 mph.

Even at ground windspeed of 18mph tested with an anometer I will not fly, as windspeed at height will more than likely exceed the crafts rating. A cautionary tale.

PFAW Holder
BNUC-S Qualified

 

[BudWalker]

Hello

I purchased Phantom 4 on July 12th.

After using Phantom 4 for a week, I got fascinated by the stability and quality of shots.

So I decided to add Inspire Pro and ordered one on July 27th and got delivered on Aug 5th.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/22219381 ... =STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

I enjoy swapping the lenses using Inspire Pro with 12mm, 15mm, 25mm, 45mm lenses.

I am on more photographer side than videographer.


I brought my Phantom 4 and Inspire Pro to Steptoe Butte in Palouse, Washington State and took nice pictures on Aug 13th.

I use my Phantom 4 for wide shot and Inspire Pro for telephoto using 45mm F1.8 Olympus lens.

I had been back to that place 3 times more with my drones.

I had flown Inspire Pro up to 400ft(120m) up there and rotate all around without moving.



On Aug 27th, I had been back to Steptoe for 4th time.

There has been somewhat strong wind around 20mile hr.

This time I had been more careful to fly up to only 60ft up there and took some pictures for 9 minutes with no problem.





Then I switched to video mode and started taking video around.

Around 2 minutes of passing, it drifted to north side by 300ft although I did not touch right side stick to move around.

With 35% of battery remaining, I touched RTH comand but the inspire was not coming back to home position properly.

Thus I cancelled the RTH Comand and had tried to maneuver home manually.

But it had kept drifting and ran out of battery and crashed into the woods.



I recovered the drone using GPS coordinate without much difficulty.

The landing gear got a lot of damage and one propeller got broken.

But amazingly, main controller including GPS, gimball with camera and 4 motors seems to be working fine even after the crash.

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Accept third party cookies

If you go to above link, you can watch the unedited video showing the course of crash.

It may have touched the fine tree and fell under one side.

I also attach the flight record.



My first question is why Inspire Pro had drifted around 100ft although I had not touched right side stick at all.

The second quesion is why RTH command does not work properly.

There had been somewhat strong wind, but if you watch Youtube video, the wind had not been that extreme.





I would like to get your opinion whether the repair shall be covered by DJI warranty.




I had enjoyed the quality of picture using Phantom 4 and Inspire Pro so far, but I will be more cautious in flying them around after this incident.

thanks in advance

Thomas

The .DAT will have a lot more information than the .txt you provided. If you can provide the .DAT there is a good chance we can determine the cause of your incident. To see how to retrieve the .DAT go here. It will be large and can't be uploaded here. You'll need to provide it as a Dropbox link (or equivalent).

 

[Ftolino]

To get 17 minutes outta I1 pro that's a feat

 

[Bill Hagstotz]

Microwave antennas certainly are something to avoid if at all possible. I was in a remote area of Canada on a site with a data tower (dish) transmitting. It caused some interference with the Inspire 1. Bottom-line the variables effecting flights are constant. Software/technology all has to work. These drones are great tools for filming. I don't believe DJI and other manufactures were expecting the demand nor their R&D being fine tuned as best as it can be. We all are in the R&D experiment. Eventually or we can only hope these companies are spending the necessary time fine tuning these craft and software apps etc.

 

[shaun666]

This is just my personal approach, if you don't want to crash treat it like a manned aircraft, don't fly in dangerous conditions that exceed the design of the aircraft, always monitor you (fuel level) battery level & get much more flight time in and you don't use the AUTO features like RTH or auto take off, if you need to use these you need more practice. I have had RTH initiate on when I lost signal and as soon as the UAV climbed to the set RTH altitude I instantly retook control of the aircraft as the pilot has a much better chance of landing safely when there are any variables involves like wind, trees, buildings ect... I'm not saying it has to be all serious & no fun but if you stick to a few procedures the only thing that should happen is great flying & images, again this is just how I approach using these products & it has worked for me.

 

[shaun666]

I just watched the vision & the violent camera movement made shudder, I just hope you are not using the same game like joystick inputs when you fly the Inspire.
Every second of video can be useful & awesome if done smoothly. I have had some of my best shots come from re-framing to a new shot but it was done carefully not flicking the controls. Just me again but as people are paying for my time so I try to maximise the useful vision from every flight.

 

[go fast]

Wow you came close to those power lines , that was wild video , had to be stressful...

 

[shaun666]

I think that everyone has stated the obvious without saying it, it was unsafe to fly at that time in that location at the altitude flown & in close proximity to transmission towers and everything else, let alone the wind speed on the day. The shots if urgent still could have been achieved without the UAV being deployed so close to these hazards, I often have to takeoff & land in an area not close to what I am filming so I have a safe launch & recovery area which confuses some client when they are trying to gain access to some difficult locations that I can easily fly to in minutes get the shots then come back & land safely. I am still every day refining my techniques every day to ensure not only great shots but more importantly for me safety. So I hope there is a lesson learnt from this event by the pilot.