First day of quad ownership and it's been lost already!
Made a catalogue of rookie errors, got a little bit of indoor practice in, found that pretty difficult because of the obstacles but on a windy, rainy morning I had no other choice.
Then the sun came out and I had a couple of semi successful (if completely amateur) runs in the local park with 10-14mph winds.
After dinner and as it was getting dark I decided to go out and run down a few batteries in the still evening air. The wind was now pretty non-existent and I thought it would be a great opportunity to take some footage at high altitude.
Up to 1:05 everything was going well, the x4 was pretty much directly above me, stable and now a little black dot against the dark blue sky, I gave it a bit of rudder to change the camera view......and then lost signal (I think).
I recall seeing the black dot appear to move away from me (maybe it was decending?), by now I had no idea which way it was facing (due to my brainwave to move the rudder), I shut down the throttle, gunned it but whatever I did seemed to have no effect in the direction of travel, and then I lost sight completely!
The little Hubsan was so far away when I lost it, and with a small woodland area ahead I had literally no concept for how far from me it had fell (and whether it could have made it as far as the main road or houses). The next 9 minutes (cut in the video) involved me walking around amongst trees hitting the throttle hoping to hear at least one motor spin up (not a good practice I know, but literally my only hope). The light was failing and just as I gave up hope I heard the scream of a motor!!!! About a minute of wading through thick bramble and stinging nettles and I was reunited with the little bird!!
Feeling pretty stupid all in all, the stinging nettles have provided some rough justice though!! Just glad it didn't hurt somebody, or hit the £170,000 McLaren MP4-12C parked at a house opposite the park!
