Amazon Plans To Deploy Delivery Drones In the UK and Italy Next Year (theverge.com) 16
Amazon announced today that it plans to expand its Prime Air drone delivery program to Italy and United Kingdom, as well as one more yet-to-be-named U.S. city. "The new Prime Air locations will be announced in the coming months, with an anticipated launch date of late 2024," reports The Verge. From the report: Another step by Amazon today suggests it's ready to make drones a more serious part of its actual delivery network. The company said it plans to add Prime Air delivery to its existing fulfillment network -- specifically by adding delivery drones to some of its same-delivery sites. Prime Air drones currently only operate out of the two standalone sites in Texas and California, so expanding drones to other sites means a wider delivery range and closer integration with Amazon's delivery network.
Amazon also gave us a sneak peek of its new Prime Air delivery drone that it claims flies twice as far as its current model. Even more critically, the drones will be able to operate in light rain and what Amazon calls more "diverse weather." The company released photos of the MK30 drone today, which it said will replace its existing delivery drones by late 2024.
The MK30 is also smaller and quieter than the existing Prime Air model, Amazon claims. The new drone can deliver objects of up to five pounds, with a typical delivery time of "one hour or less." The new drone includes a "sense and avoid" feature that can help it avoid pets, people, and property. The new design will hopefully result in smoother flights. "Not only will this help boost the economy, offering consumers even more choice while helping keep the environment clean with zero emission technology, but it will also build our understanding how to best use the new technology safely and securely," said UK's Aviation Minister Baroness Vere in a statement in Amazon's announcement.
Amazon also gave us a sneak peek of its new Prime Air delivery drone that it claims flies twice as far as its current model. Even more critically, the drones will be able to operate in light rain and what Amazon calls more "diverse weather." The company released photos of the MK30 drone today, which it said will replace its existing delivery drones by late 2024.
The MK30 is also smaller and quieter than the existing Prime Air model, Amazon claims. The new drone can deliver objects of up to five pounds, with a typical delivery time of "one hour or less." The new drone includes a "sense and avoid" feature that can help it avoid pets, people, and property. The new design will hopefully result in smoother flights. "Not only will this help boost the economy, offering consumers even more choice while helping keep the environment clean with zero emission technology, but it will also build our understanding how to best use the new technology safely and securely," said UK's Aviation Minister Baroness Vere in a statement in Amazon's announcement.
First UK test ... (Score:2)
Re: First UK test ... (Score:2)
Coven?? Pretty sure witches aren't going to be happy with drones in their airspace.
Every Year Hype. (Score:2)
Strangely, we hear this kind of announcement every year.
It's hype.
Re: (Score:3)
Is it a drone in the open category (in which case it requires CAA approval, registration and line-of-sight), or is it an aircraft (in which case it basically needs a responsible trained pilot and flightplans, etc.)
If it's carrying any significant weight, it's not in the open category. If it's large enough to carry weight, it won't be able to fly over buildings, people, etc. If it's weighty and flying over people, you need all kinds of things and the CAA basically doesn't even have categories for this kind
Re: (Score:2)
The CAA is working on it; New trials move the UK closer to allowing everyday drone deliveries and flying beyond visual line of sight [caa.co.uk]. No reason to think regulations will be a showstopper in the not-too-distant future.
Re: (Score:2)
And not a mention of Amazon, but some extremely early-stage prototyping flights with strict flight paths, surveillance and prototyping - mostly to do with healthcare, existing airports, or things far outside of civilisation.
You'd think they'd push it if Amazon were involved, and you'd think Amazon would be advertising their involvement far and wide.
Fact is, it's a very different thing to have a skilled operator fly urgent medical samples between two well-defined hospital locations with prior CAA authority a
No thank you (for non-life threatening deliveries) (Score:5, Insightful)
The airspace - low and high - is a shared resource. And by zipping your drone over my place, you will be annoying me visually and audibly.
This is a little bit like the electrical scooters that popped up unregulated in cities across the world. At first self-service scooters were hailed as a great new thing. Corporations, being corporations, grabbed that opportunity and did their capitalist thing. Then the numbers of scooters littering the sidewalks and the number of accidents, skyrocketed. And now e.g. Paris has banned them
The airspace should be reserved for the stuff that actually deserves it. Emergency vehicles do not flash their lights and use their sirens unless they are rushing to get somewhere in order to prevent loss of lives or crimes. We should have a similar level of respect for the use of the airspace. If we want commercial players to be allowed to use the airspace, we should tax the **** out of that use, as a way to get to use that public good. It should be so expensive that you would only use it to deliver gold-crusted pizzas. And even then, partially because there are people with f*** you money who could fill the air regardless using drones to buy a pack of gum, the amount of stuff we allow to go up there should be very limited.
Re: (Score:2)
Under UK law you wouldn't be able to prevail with a noise complaint against a drone that is only in the area for a few seconds, unless it was loud enough to damage your hearing or property.
You can't do much about children playing or the occasional dog bark either. The threshold for noise complaints is quite high.
Re: (Score:3)
They're not even particularly loud anyway.
Compare and contrast to the usual Amazon guy in a van blatting through side-streets, for example.
The problem is not the noise, the problem is that they will have cameras, and that they are flying machines carrying weight.
Pretty much, the aviation regulators will just ban them (or, more accurately, never permit them as they're not currently permitted), if not then the privacy advocates will have them.
And where are you flying them from/to? Some local depot? The plan
Re: (Score:2)
One single drone is not much of a problem. But there is Kant's categorigal imperative, for which a litmus test whether is something is ok, is whether it would be ok if you applied that rule to everyone.
So imagine everyone is using drones to get pizzas, hot meals, legal prescription drugs, whatever ... all times of day/night. If you live in a moderately densely populated area, you will have drones whizzing around all the time. Even if the noise was not that loud, you will constantly be pinged with drone soun
This approach has already proved successful (Score:4, Funny)
I'm told a large drone-centred delivery network has already been in existence for over a year, and it has managed to successfully deliver significant payloads in an accurate and timely manner. It must be said, though, the Ukrainians who established it have been pretty clear that avoiding people and property isn't exactly the point of the exercise.
Mini documentary on delivery drones (Score:2)
As I suspected, it's a lot more difficult & complicated than Amazon is letting on & Amazon is apparently quite far behind the competition in this area. From what I've seen in the video above, this kind of service looks like it's only really feasible for
Really? (Score:2)
How?
Drones aren't licensed in the UK unless the operator maintains line-of-sight at all times.
So unless some guy is doing this to stop himself getting out of the van, that's not going to be of any use at all.
Obligatory watch (Score:2)
next year (Score:2)
I can hear the future... (Score:2)