Why Two Amazon Drones Crashed at a Test Facility in a December (msn.com) 19
While Amazon won FAA approval to fly beyond an operators' visual line of sight, "the program remains a work in progress," reports Bloomberg:
A pair of Amazon.com Inc. package delivery drones were flying through a light rain in mid-December when, within minutes of one another, they both committed robot suicide... [S]ome 217 feet (66 meters) in the air [at a drone testing facility], the aircraft cut power to its six propellers, fell to the ground and was destroyed. Four minutes later and 183 feet over the taxiway, a second Prime Air drone did the same thing.
Not long after the incidents, Amazon paused its experimental drone flights to tweak the aircraft software but said the crashes weren't the "primary reason" for halting the program. Now, five months after the twin crashes, a more detailed explanation of what happened is starting to emerge. Faulty readings from lidar sensors made the drones think they had landed, prompting the software to shut down the propellers, according to National Transportation Safety Board documents reviewed by Bloomberg. The sensors failed after a software update made them more susceptible to being confused by rain, the NTSB said.
Amazon also removed a backup sensor present that had been present on earlier iterations, according to the article — though an Amazon spokesperson said the company had found ways to replicate the removed sensors.
But Bloomberg notes Amazon's drone efforts has faced "technical challenges and crashes, including one in 2021 that set a field ablaze at the company's testing facility in Pendleton, Oregon." Deliveries are currently limited to College Station, Texas, and greater Phoenix, with plans to expand to Kansas City, Missouri, the Dallas area and San Antonio, as well as the UK and Italy. Starting with a craft that looked like a hobbyist drone — and was vulnerable to even modest gusts of wind — Amazon went through dozens of designs to toughen the vehicle and ultimately make it capable of carting about 5 pounds, giving it the capability to transport items typically ordered from its warehouses. Engineers settled on a six-propeller design that takes off vertically before cruising like a plane. The first model to make regular customer deliveries, the MK27, was succeeded last year by the MK30, which flies at about 67 miles an hour and can deliver packages up to 7.5 miles from its launch point. The craft takes off, flies and lands autonomously.
Not long after the incidents, Amazon paused its experimental drone flights to tweak the aircraft software but said the crashes weren't the "primary reason" for halting the program. Now, five months after the twin crashes, a more detailed explanation of what happened is starting to emerge. Faulty readings from lidar sensors made the drones think they had landed, prompting the software to shut down the propellers, according to National Transportation Safety Board documents reviewed by Bloomberg. The sensors failed after a software update made them more susceptible to being confused by rain, the NTSB said.
Amazon also removed a backup sensor present that had been present on earlier iterations, according to the article — though an Amazon spokesperson said the company had found ways to replicate the removed sensors.
But Bloomberg notes Amazon's drone efforts has faced "technical challenges and crashes, including one in 2021 that set a field ablaze at the company's testing facility in Pendleton, Oregon." Deliveries are currently limited to College Station, Texas, and greater Phoenix, with plans to expand to Kansas City, Missouri, the Dallas area and San Antonio, as well as the UK and Italy. Starting with a craft that looked like a hobbyist drone — and was vulnerable to even modest gusts of wind — Amazon went through dozens of designs to toughen the vehicle and ultimately make it capable of carting about 5 pounds, giving it the capability to transport items typically ordered from its warehouses. Engineers settled on a six-propeller design that takes off vertically before cruising like a plane. The first model to make regular customer deliveries, the MK27, was succeeded last year by the MK30, which flies at about 67 miles an hour and can deliver packages up to 7.5 miles from its launch point. The craft takes off, flies and lands autonomously.
Words "crash" and "test" are highly correlated (Score:2)
Why Two Amazon Drones Crashed at a Test Facility in a December
The words "crash" and "test" are highly correlated. So are the concepts of crash and aircraft and bad weather. No surprise at this headline.
Faulty readings from lidar sensors made the drones think they had landed, prompting the software to shut down the propellers
Interesting, but hardly surprising. LIDAR is known to have faulty detection in rain.
Seems legit (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Or in this case, the crash rate goes up because Amazon are trying to make them as cheap as possible by removing any redundancy. Gotta make them cheaper than a delivery van.
Re: (Score:2)
Really primitive drones wouldn't have had this kind of failure, because they would have used a more limited but also more reliable ultrasonic sensor. It uses 1970s technology (except with a 1990s technology IC onboard) which has been more or less perfected.
Of course, if they had just had a backup sensor to cross-check with their LIDAR, this still wouldn't have happened, so this is just because they were being cheap. The most rational backup would have been... actually another LIDAR sensor, but a far more li
Re: (Score:2)
Or momentary switches on the landing legs.
Re: (Score:2)
You're not necessarily wrong, but more moving parts come with their own special kinds of problems.
Oh my god! (Score:2)
Is the December OK? Can anyone check up on it?
FORM LETTER TO AMAZON (Score:1)
Your name
Your address
The date
Amazon
Address
Re: UAVs in my airspace are disallowed
Dear Amazon,
I am (your name here) and I reside at (your address here). The airspace from ground level to 400 feet above ground level at this property is under my control as per FAA regulations. Your "drones" travel at up to almost 70MPH and carry themselves (80 pounts for the MK27-2) and up to 5 pounds of cargo. From even only 100ft high, the instantaneous force of a crash exceeds 42,500 lbf. As your "drones" have shown a pr
Re: (Score:2)
So what? If a few hundred thousand people sent those letters, Amazon would drown in legal fees.
Re: (Score:2)
Your name
Your address
The date
Amazon
Address
Re: UAVs in my airspace are allowed
Dear Amazon, I am (your name here) and I reside at (your address here). The airspace from ground level to 400 feet above ground level at this property is under my control as per FAA regulations and I would like to allow you to use my airspace to perform anti-gavron operations as you see fit to ensure that your deluxe drone delivery service remains available so that I and other fun loving futurists can e
Sounds like a bad idea (Score:2)
Removing redundant systems until you can still pass the tests doesn't make for a reliable aircraft.
These things are going to be flying over people. They need to not just fall from the sky when a single sensor fails.
Imagine "The crash was caused by the heater failing in the pitot tube, causing it to ice over and report a 0 speed. The aircraft shut off both its engines and returned all control surfaces to a neutral position because it thought it had landed."
If you had an altimeter (Score:2)
And a GPS with a map you'd think you could figure out how far off the ground you are
737 Max vibes (Score:2)
So they removed redundant sensors and said, basically, "We'll fix it in post."
I guess the stakes are lower than the 737 Max, dropping out of the sky probably won't result in more than 1 death per incident. Still, I wouldn't want that junk flying over me.
Amazon is giving away free drones (Score:2)
It's true, Amazon is giving away free drones to anyone that can catch one and rip the GPS tracker out of it.
Zipline (Score:2)
Simple fix (Score:2)
A cheap lightweight contact sensor could avoid that issue, but since cheap is more expensive than free, I guess they'll do the old weigh the costs against the cost of wrongful death suits and march on.
Many Decembers to choose from? (Score:1)
Which December though?
Why specifically "A" December?
Proofreading is important.