Credit for that one goes to @BudWalker. But yes, it does seem like the most reasonable explanation.
These are actually two very different scenarios. Compass interference can cause flight behavior like what you posted, but it’s not always easy to identify just from flight data alone. Having the opportunity to see the flight video made it much clearer.
As for DJI’s comment about flying over water, I’m not sure why they mentioned that. While the Neo might not always perform perfectly over water, I wouldn’t expect it to encounter a scenario where recovery isn’t possible.
If the compass isn’t functioning properly, I don’t think the drone could do much other than land at its current location. Even if such a feature could be implemented, the flight path might still be risky until the drone reaches the ground.
As mentioned earlier, the safest approach is to ensure the drone is correctly oriented in DJI Fly before takeoff. This quick preflight check is especially crucial when flying in unfamiliar locations.
@BudWalker it seems that launching from a geomagnetically distorted site can also affect GPS positioning, as the flight log shows the aircraft in locations it never actually visited. Any thoughts on why this might have occurred?
The Neo is such an odd bird I’m not sure what to say. My suspicion is that it was using the vision system to arrive at a location solution. I.e., the heading and location errors were independent. Just a theory.
To draw a line under this the replacement Neo arrived today in Scotland. It will take me a while to get it out to Turkey
I had a chat with the DJI Tech Department . Pleasant to talk to and didn’t seem rushed or defensive.
I talked through the incident and my main safety concerns about not being able to stop the drone with Pause and it flying 4 x faster than Normal mode should allow.
He said they were incorrect when they said it was caused by flying over water. It never did.
He said it wasn’t Operator Error but in hindsight and with more knowledge , in my mind, flying it from where I did was an error and a new check has been added to my pre-flight.
I owned up about the compass pointing in the opposite direction to the direction the drone was facing. He didn’t leap on that. Just said lots of things can interfere with the GPS signal and / or compass. There are assorted failsafes built in. I think he said they were missing some metadata from when the GPS complained briefly about signal. He said they just don’t see this type of behaviour.
He tried the “wind may have caused it to drift” but there was no wind. The bay was like a mirror.
Bottom line is they can’t explain it , or why it flew away from Home at 52.6 mph and couldn’t be Paused
But I shouldn’t worry … it will probably never happen again
Thanks everyone for your input and for the Flight Record Viewer
I’m not sure the drone could pause itself without access to accurate GPS and/or compass data. Assuming a geomagnetically distorted location is to blame here, this is how all of those scenarios end.
I eventually got round to getting the N3 Controller back to the UK and sent back to be checked (as DJI suggested)
They say they found a fault with the DJI RC-N3 Core Board
I asked them what symptoms that might have caused. The reply was ;
“as per checking here , due to the core board malfunction it cause the image to be delayed during testing . hence since we value you as our loyal customer the support team replaced the remote controller for you”
We will see when I get back to the UK myself and am reunited with my replacement Neo and Controller
That’s an interesting discovery, but it doesn’t appear to be related to your incident above. While any delay between the aircraft and the remote controller can be problematic, in this case, your aircraft was adjusting its position autonomously.
That said, it’s good to hear DJI continues to actively assist customers and maintain their commitment to support.
Hello I lost my NEO yesterday in a similar situation.
NEO didn’t pick up the satellite right away, it set a “homepoint” far from me, and without explanation it flew away from me and crashed into the sea - I can’t rescue it
BR
Marco
I have a DJI neo that i bought on september 5, 2025, I have been flying it occasionally with my RC-N3 controller and it worked fine and never did anything wrong so I never crashed it. On october 19, 2025 I encountered problems with the Neo, I went to fly it near a field, there was no strong wind, I waited till I had enough satelites (it had about 30) and the homepoint was updated. The radio level was at 100% and all batteries were full. I took off and started climbing, when it reached some 20m above me, it started to fly away and I lost all communications and video. I could not control the Neo at all and it flew away from me, like somebody had taken over. I started looking for it but it was no longer connected to the Neo, after a while it had a brief connection and I saw some plants of the field on my screen, it looked like it was on the ground, then te connection was lost again. I tried find my drone, but it said: No connection to the drone. After trying for a while it suddenly had connection again and I turned on the beeping signal. Finally I found it in the field and it was not very far from where it started, it had flown away, made some strange patterns and seemed tho have returned after a while. There was nothing damaged and it looked fine. However after this incident I lost faith in the Neo and I didn’t fly it again ouside.
Hello. I had this problem after flying over sea water. I contacted DJI and sent them the log files… they sent me a new NEO. This summer I only flew for 5 seconds over lake water and it lost control again and crashed and hit a dog in a park. Very bad…
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