Poor Spark is Gone Forever RIP Sparquel

[tbates]

Hi guys, would somebody mind looking at my flight log and helping me understand what went wrong?

I was flying my drone and taking a few pictures when all of the sudden it took off. I had no control and could not make it “return to home” even though I tried over and over.

I knew the direction it went and drove to the football field. We walked every bleacher, the field and I even made the maintenance man get on top of the 4 story field house to look for it. We were there for hours and still nothing.

I decoded the flight log and it said YAW error, and Abnormal compass function or GPS signal detected. Aircraft switched to ATTI mode.

Any ideas? This was my 79th flight and I’ve had this kind of problem.

I’m so sad, I feel like I need a drone funeral.

[msinger]

Please upload your TXT flight log here and post the link back here.

[tbates]

http://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/M7N5KP89UBD76MWN2F49/

Please let me know if this works. Thx.

[msinger]

Did you take off from concrete? If so, that’s most likely what caused those compass issues. A lot of concrete sidewalks and driveways contain rebar – and that confuses the compass when it gets to close to the Spark while it’s powered on.

At the end of your flight log, the Spark was about 108 feet above the football field. If your remote controller disconnected from the Spark right at that point, it would have started auto landing at its current location 3 seconds later _(since it was not using its GPS data and the home point was not marked)_.

The light wind could have pushed your Spark beyond the stands. Try looking everywhere within this yellow box.

[tbates]

I took off from gravel. : /

Not too sure if gravel has metal in it.

I still think it’s weird that it literally took off. I pushed “Return to home” and I just kept getting an error “command time out.”

Any idea if DJI will send a replacement?

PS - Thanks sooooo much for looking at my flight logs.

[msinger]

@tbates

Any idea if DJI will send a replacement?

I’m thinking probably not after they see how close you were to that sidewalk (the yellow pin is the takeoff location). You could try contacting DJI support and see what they say.

[tbates]

Thanks! I wrote to DJI, I’ll let you know what they say.

Thx again,
Tara

[JJB]

Hi Tara,

Have you found your Spark ? See YourPoint where i think it has landed.

btw, HP was set during autotake-off.

cheers
JJB

[tbates]

Hey guys, I wanted to show you my follow up from DJI. Guess they are sending me a new Spark…what are the odds? I’ve asked them to explain why it happened but I still don’t have an answer.

[msinger]

Thanks for the update! Beware the concrete when you’re out flying with your new Spark