Amazon's Drones Gets Key Approval, Can Now Fly Farther to More Customers (apnews.com) 19
The Associated Press reports that U.S. federal regulators "have given Amazon key permission that will allow it to expand its drone delivery program, the company announced Thursday."
In a blog post published on its website, Seattle-based Amazon said that the Federal Aviation Administration has given its Prime Air delivery service the OK to operate drones "beyond visual line of sight," removing a barrier that has prevented its drones from traveling longer distances. With the approval, Amazon pilots can now operate drones remotely without seeing it with their own eyes.
An FAA spokesperson said the approval applies to College Station, Texas, where the company launched drone deliveries in late 2022. Amazon said its planning to immediately scale its operations in that city in an effort to reach customers in more densely populated areas. It says the approval from regulators also "lays the foundation" to scale its operations to more locations around the country...
Amazon, which has sought this permission for years, said it received approval from regulators after developing a strategy that ensures its drones could detect and avoid obstacles in the air. Furthermore, the company said it submitted other engineering information to the FAA and conducted flight demonstrations in front of federal inspectors. Those demonstrations were also done "in the presence of real planes, helicopters, and a hot air balloon to demonstrate how the drone safely navigated away from each of them," Amazon said.
The article also points out that by the end of the decade, Amazon "has a goal of delivering 500 million packages by drone every year."
To achieve this, Amazon said in its blog post, "we knew we had to design a system capable of serving highly populated areas and that was safer than driving to the store."
An FAA spokesperson said the approval applies to College Station, Texas, where the company launched drone deliveries in late 2022. Amazon said its planning to immediately scale its operations in that city in an effort to reach customers in more densely populated areas. It says the approval from regulators also "lays the foundation" to scale its operations to more locations around the country...
Amazon, which has sought this permission for years, said it received approval from regulators after developing a strategy that ensures its drones could detect and avoid obstacles in the air. Furthermore, the company said it submitted other engineering information to the FAA and conducted flight demonstrations in front of federal inspectors. Those demonstrations were also done "in the presence of real planes, helicopters, and a hot air balloon to demonstrate how the drone safely navigated away from each of them," Amazon said.
The article also points out that by the end of the decade, Amazon "has a goal of delivering 500 million packages by drone every year."
To achieve this, Amazon said in its blog post, "we knew we had to design a system capable of serving highly populated areas and that was safer than driving to the store."
Just like all AI... (Score:3)
As with everything AI, it's all great until it encounters something it doesn't recognize. So it was that when Amazon's drones encountered the last of the flying purple people eaters, it did not know to avoid it. That's how it became a one-eyed, one-horned flying purple people eater.
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I wonder how long? (Score:3)
I wonder how long it will be before we see the first headline, "Amazon drone severely injures pedestrian while delivering cat food."?
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Many systems lower packages from 50' (15.000mm) or so to get the packages down without involving blades near animals.
I'll still wait several days after ordering a liquid to order anything else so leaks don'g ruin everything.
Re: I wonder how long? (Score:3)
It's not just the blades. Cat food can be heavy and cause injuries when dropped. In fact, boxes of cat food are some of the heaviest packages I receive from Amazon. They are unlikely to ever be shipped by drone for that reason.
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>> I wonder how long it will be before ...drone severely injures pedestrian
It will take long. Hint: Not practical, and not competitive.
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Or 'Car Accident #316 This Year Caused by Driver Staring at Flying Delivery Drone'
This must be stopped! (Score:3)
We can't have high-efficiency renewable-energy powered cost-saving drones quickly delivering what I want... wait, actually that sounds kind of nice.
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It would seem to me that delivery to rural areas would be the most efficient use of this technology, rather than urban delivery. If we buy a new set of towels for our Airbnb it doesn't make sense to me to send a 1-ton vehicle and its driver for a half hour dive to the middle of nowhere with no other deliveries nearby, and then drive another half hour back. Spent five minutes to stick it in the drone, send it off, and have that van and driver go do something useful for an hour. That's not incidentally the
Awesome!! (Score:3, Funny)
More stuff for me and my trusty butterfly net!!
I wish they COULD fly.. (Score:1)
Time To Try Out My New Jammer! (Score:1)
Probably get stuck with a box of make up and tampons.
Interesting (Score:2)
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Actually Amazon has been running into unwarranted interference since the beginning. This thing was ready for out of line of sight flight trials years ago,(at least three years before I retired two years ago) and several competitors who seemed considerably less prepared have been approved while Amazon hits one roadblock after another. I can't help but wonder if this doesn't have something to do with Amazon's complete 100% anti-bribery position (which also causes them a lot of headaches working in India and
How does this work with an apartment building? (Score:2)
Please no ... (Score:2)
There are enough problems with traffic and noise pollution as it is, without adding dronings randomly zipping around overhead to the mix. Fine as an emergency measure for e.g. sending that critical adrenalin shot to someone going into anafalytic shock, similar to how emergency response vehicles get to skip traffic. Not fine for serving people who cannot bother to get pizza by conventional means.
Airport Radius (Score:2)
So, a thought occurs to me. This does not negate the FAA rule that drones flying within five miles of an airport need to notify the airport of their flight, etc. I know that in my area, my Amazon distribution center lies within that five mile radius of our regional (with 1st-Tier airlines) airport, and they would definitely fall within this restriction.
It seems to me that a lot of cities in the US have distribution centers that are very likely within the radius of an airport. How is this going to be handled