Question about a drone battery that failed mid-flight on a site survey

I was doing a routine site survey for a new apartment complex in Tempe last Thursday, about 20 minutes into the flight. The drone, a DJI Mavic 3 Enterprise, just dropped out of the sky. No warning, no low battery alert, nothing. It fell about 60 feet into a cleared dirt area, luckily missing any equipment. The battery was at 45% according to the log. I checked it before takeoff and it seemed fine, no swelling. I'm thinking it was a sudden cell failure. Has anyone else had a drone battery fail like this without any signs? What's your pre-flight check routine now to catch something like this?

4 comments

4 Comments

xena58219d ago

Wait, so you had no warning at all with a Mavic 3 Enterprise? That's wild. I had a similar thing happen with my Phantom 4 last year and it scared me straight. @violag80, I gotta disagree with you on this one. Relying on the smart battery to catch everything is a gamble. I check voltage per cell every time now after my crash, and I've caught two batteries that showed good percentage but had one cell way lower than the others. It doesn't take more than a minute, and it beats watching your drone fall out of the sky. The smart circuit can't always stop a sudden cell failure if it happens mid-flight, that's the problem.

victor_hill443mo ago

You said it fell from 60 feet with the battery at 45%. I saw a forum post last month about a similar sudden drop with a Mavic 3 battery around 50%. Their theory was a bad cell causing instant voltage crash. My pre-flight is more paranoid now. I check the battery voltage per cell in the app before every single flight, not just the overall percentage.

nancy3263mo ago

That voltage check sounds like overkill for most people. These batteries have smart circuits to stop a bad cell from causing a crash. Relying on percentage should be fine if the battery isn't old or damaged. Constantly digging into the app settings just adds stress and time before flying. Isn't the whole point to get up in the air and enjoy it?

violag803mo ago

Checking voltage per cell is just extra steps for no real gain. The smart battery should handle it all automatically.