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Crashed it

jlehet

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Joined
Jan 5, 2022
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Well, the new Evo II Pro drone is on the way back to Autel. Bad crash. It was my second session with the drone, first one took off and landed a handful of times flew around line of sight over my property and neighboring land. Went well, but I should have learned from it: namely if there are obstructions somewhat nearby (my deck) it's easier to take off than to have the drone land.

So, second session, I was excited to go to a pretty obscure place, which I have been photographing in for 40+ years now. It's a gorge in vermont, full of icy walls and rocks with a little river running through it. It's a place where nobody goes much. I don't think I've ever seen another human while I've been there. At my age, after witnessing my wife get a major broken bone a couple of years ago, I was excited to have the drone to fly in there instead of climbing in there as I used to do.

So I got there in the late afternoon, dim light, and the trail and cliff-side were quite overgrown with mostly hemlock trees. More tree cover than I remembered. I found a spot with a gap through to the gulch but of course full cover overhead -- and the gorge itself was open overhead. Launched. Drone rose up about 5 feet, perfect, and I easily took it through the gap in the hemlock trees, which seemed fairly generous at the time. I flew it around in there line of sight, which went well, mostly. Got my blood pressure up at one point. I was going close to a dam because the ice was cool on it, and I got the alert that contact was lost. (Still in sight, not very far) Oh oh. (I realized later it was a hydro dam, and there must have been RF coming from it.) After a few stressful seconds, seemed like a month, it went straight up and closer to me. I couldn't quite see where it was up there, through the tree cover above me, but I got control back and flew it around some more down in the gorge, taking still photos, then the battery was headed toward 25% so I started to manually fly it toward me. But it would not come in through the same gap in the hemlocks it went out through. I tried subtle nuances of approach to see if I could get it to come in, but it wouldn't. Obstructions too close. And then in the last attempt, moving it sideways, a propeller nicked a hemlock branch. "zzzt" and the propeller was broken, drone falling. It was about nose level to me, but maybe 80 feet down to the very bottom of the gorge.

I figured it was toast, but I might as well go see. I had micro spikes on my boots and started walking down the trail. So then the it got worse. I guess I fell on the ice and slid down. I hit my head, blacked out, I guess kept sliding like a ragdoll. Bruises on various parts of my body I don't remember getting. (I should repeat that I've been down there many times even in winter, and this time I had my micro spikes on.) I found myself standing at the bottom by the drone. I knew it was my drone, and I picked it up. I knew where I was. I had absolutely no memory of anything other than those two facts at all. Absolutely uncluttered mind. First time I've ever had amnesia. I figured I should climb out, and I did, and as I did I remembered more and more things, crashing the drone, etc. Gathered up my gear and started walking out toward the car. I decided I was OK to drive, and I was. My wife made me go to the ER, which was a good decision on her part. CT scan showed my skull to be intact and my brain not bleeding.

Oh, and the drone wasn't in too too bad shape. I thought it would be shattered. One motor arm is a little bent -- it doesn't sit flat on the table. Another propeller is gone, and the top of that motor is a bit banged. So probably two motor arms. The gimbal looks OK, we'll see. On the table it initializes and I get "ready to fly." I didn't see the trajectory after it dropped, but under the drop there was a very angled bunch of ice on the wall. I think it skittered down that angled but near vertical ice wall and then down a more shallow angled ice shelf and stopped before it hit the water. It did not really fall straight onto a hard surface.

In retrospect I understand I could have done two things. I could have tried to find another place along the cliff edge with fewer trees and bring it there, even if it landed in the snow. Or I could have disabled vision and brought it right in where me, without obstacle avoidance, and landed it on the landing pad. If I had a full battery I would have been more thoughtful, I think.

That's the news, sitting here with a concussion and no drone.
 
Everyone is always wondering if someone gets the drone back but there is a whole other side of this question and that is how you get to the drone and if it is safe. Glad to hear you are ok.

LOS is really important and the farther you are away the more sensitive it gets, trees are no exception. Your RTH should be able to work in every flight, instead of flying through gaps and cutting your angle off with LOS, take off farther away from the trees or higher up on a hill.

Hope you back up soon, Good luck!
 
Man, that really sucks. Glad you are okay. It sounds like it could have been much worse!

Like you said, you could have just switched the OA off and flew right in. This is the classic case of several factors adding up to a problem. The low battery made you nervous and so you didn't consider the option of turning off OA at the time.

These drones are amazing. But when you get fixed up, try and set aside some time to practice all kinds of scenarios in a safe place (for you and the drone) so that when something happens, you already have some "muscle memory" of how to effectivley handle it. The addreneline rush when things are not going well is not the time to figure it out.
 
Yeah, definitely, and I'd already had an adrenaline rush from the hydro dam RF. I think the only way to fly the drone properly in there would have been to climb down a bit (which is where I fell). Just a few feet off the cliff on the "trail" down it's open above and unobstructed. It's not really a trail down, just a less steep part of the cliff where it's possible to scramble down in summer. I have done it in winter, but I don't know how. It's solid ice at an angle. Maybe could find a flat spot on that ice, but no way I'm going to go on it at this point. I was trying to not climb down there at all. In summer, no problem. But it's more interesting looking with ice in there. I'll have to go back there when I get up and running and see if there is *any* unobstructed spot with clear overhead and LOS in the gorge. I do not think there is. I think I scratch this place off my drone pilot list.

Here is the place, an exposure on 4 x 5 sheet film done 40 years ago+. It's a better photo than anything I did with the drone. My path down was just to the left out of the frame of this photo.
 

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I have never seen another human being in there. Once I saw a very large great horned owl flying through.
 
That’s terrible, wishing you a speedy recovery. After what you went through, drones can be replaced but you are far more important hopefully you have a full recovery.

i sort of had a bad day myself two years ago, had both knees replaced and just when the second knee was completed went flying few days later. Still on crutches, my drone went down on hilly cattle land. Took me for ever to hike out there to recover the drone, And I fell several times while hiking out there and back. Miserable painful experience, but that’s nothing in comparison to what you experience.

Please keep us posted with your recovery,
 
If I thought there was much chance of falling and having an outcome like this I would have absolutely have let the drone down there. But man, I had no idea: set out, walking comfortably with my microspikes on my boots, and then wake up probably 50 yards away. Last think I remember is walking calmly, comfortably, confidently. I really could have died. About 30 degrees F, nobody goes there. Almost dusk. If I had stayed blacked out for a long time it would have been bad, and of course the head injury could have been even worse. Feeling crummy, but so far not as bad as the concussion I had as a kid, when I couldn't even focus my eyes and light was awful, couldn't hold a thought, puking, headache. I kind of expected I was heading there, since it's a bad sign to be unconscious and get amnesia. But I seem to at least be able to write and work in lightroom a bit.
 
Holy cow man, glad you're ok. I've done some risky stuff to retrieve drones before but nothing like your story! Get better soon and next time that happens, screw the drone. It's not worth your life.
 
Thanks. Getting closer to normal every day and less and less afraid I've done real damage to my head. Definitely don't do crazy stuff to get the drone back! In retrospect it was probably risky to walk down that ice even with micro spikes on, but at the time it seemed like the kind of normal stuff I often do for photography. Gonna pull way back from that kind of dangerous walking!
 
So I'm doing OK after my fall/head injury. My brain seems to be working fine; the concussion wasn't as bad as might be expected considering I was knocked out and had amnesia. Autel seems like they were great... we'll see. Fedex on the other hand was horrible. The drone spent a week stuck in a truck outside the Redmond WA sorting facility. So it took two weeks to get it to Autel. Autel, on their part turned it around almost instantly and deemed it a warranty repair. It's unclear what, if anything they did for the drone, since their email to me seemed to be boilerplate that wasn't maybe 100% accurate, so we'll see what we get back. The boilerplate said they flew it extensively and it was fine. I hadn't tried flying it before sending it back, but at least one motor arm was bent enough that it didn't sit flat on a counter, and in my fuzzy fresh-head-injury state it seemed like the tops of two of the motors were maybe damaged as well. (I didn't dare try flying it if it was off-kilter, didn't want to crash it again!). I should get it back next week.
 

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