Software Has Not Been Updated Since September 2018

For those few people still flying GoPro Karma drones ... things went south at the first of the year. Because GoPro has not updated the software for the drones since they were discontinued in September, 2018, they are apparently no longer able to receive a GPS signal.

The Verge reports that the problem seems to be related to share are called clock "rollovers" in the GPS and GLONASS satellite systems. Because there has been no software update for the Karma drones, multiple owners are reporting on message boards and drone forums that their controllers are showing error messages that they cannot receive a GPS signal, and they are unable to calibrate the compass on the aircraft. Because of the error, the drones are unflyable even after the GPS has been deactivated.

According to Wikipedia, a GPS or GLONASS rollover occurs every 1024 weeks, or 19.7 years. While the most recent GPS rollover occurred in April of last year, GLONASS reset at the end of 2019, which may be the cause of the problems now being experienced by Karma drone operators.

GoPro told The Verge that it is working on "actively troubleshooting" the issue, but did not give any indication as to when a software update might be available to get the Karma drones back into the air.

(Image from file)

FMI: Source report