Amazon Reveals New Delivery Drone Design With Range of 15 Miles (geekwire.com)

reifman writes: Amazon released new video of its futuristic drones (honestly, the thought of them buzzing around is the only thing that makes me want to join the NRA) but there's some hopefulness here. Prime Air vehicles will take advantage of sophisticated 'sense and avoid' technology, as well as a high degree of automation, to safely operate beyond the line of sight to distances of 10 miles or more. 'It looks like science fiction, but it's real: One day, seeing Prime Air vehicles will be as normal as seeing mail trucks on the road.' Amazon said its drones fly under 400 feet and weigh less than 55 pounds.

Comments

the main legit use i can see

[ganjadude]

The main legit use I can see would be to have this drone alone side of the delivery trucks. meaning the trucks get to keep driving, the drones when they get near the correct location grab the box and drop it on the doorstep. Less wasted gas due to keeping the truck moving, and more deliveries for the same reason.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Areyoukiddingme]

The main legit use I can see would be to have this drone alone side of the delivery trucks. meaning the trucks get to keep driving, the drones when they get near the correct location grab the box and drop it on the doorstep.

It's no accident that the range of the drone in the video is 15 miles. The typical major metropolitan area in the United States is about 30 miles across. One depot in the middle of the city, or two at opposite ends, and the vast majority of customers are accessible with no truck at all. That's also why the new drone is a VTOL airplane, complete with wings and a rear propeller. They were chasing that range, and wings was the way to do it.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[RubberDogBone]

There are other challenges. The city where I live has three airports roughly 1/3 of the way around the circle, so each of those airports has a six-mile no-fly zone making huge areas off limits. Worse, a state agency not actually chartered to worry about air vehicles, has on their own decided most of the remaining actual downtown is also off-limits because they don't want drones flying near state-owned buildings.

Note they have no legal constitutional ability to enforce this rule but they are doing so anyway and will arrest people regardless if they have FAA approval. Amazon won't be exempted.

Worse for Amazon, their local fulfillment warehouse is located only a mile from a major airport and in fact planes coming in or leaving pass over the Amazon facility at only about 300 feet. There is no way Amazon could use that site.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Actually, I do RTFA]

each of those airports has a six-mile no-fly zone

Which IIRC only applies above 400ft. There's a reason Amazon is aiming for below 400 ft travel.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Jack Griffin]

The typical major metropolitan area in the United States is about 30 miles across. One depot in the middle of the city, or two at opposite ends, and the vast majority of customers are accessible with no truck at all. That's also why the new drone is a VTOL airplane, complete with wings and a rear propeller. They were chasing that range, and wings was the way to do it.

Nothing explains the most difficult part of the operation, public acceptance of something potentially noisy and dangerous in public airspace.
We had the phone company try to put up a cell tower here. The design was unintrusive and as good as you could expect for a concrete pole, but the people marched on the streets and successfully blocked its installation. If people won't accept a silent, non-moving pole, there is no way this will ever get across the line.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[drinkypoo]

The city where I live has three airports roughly 1/3 of the way around the circle, so each of those airports has a six-mile no-fly zone making huge areas off limits.

Really? How do you use an airport in a no-fly zone? What airports actually have is controlled airspace, which means that you need to ask for (and receive) permission from the airport before you can fly, and you need to be in constant communication with the tower so they can for example tell you to ditch your drone if it interferes with someone having an emergency. It's not a no-fly zone.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ScentCone]

Really? How do you use an airport in a no-fly zone?

Don't be an idiot. You know perfectly well what the GP is referring to. The FAA says no UAS activity within 5 miles of an airport. To the extent that one can make advance arrangements - including special permission, a filed flight plan, etc - per flight, you might be able to get away with that. That completely rules out on-demand delivery services like those being discussed. In every practical sense, that makes the five miles surrounding airports UAS delivery NFZ's. The entire DC metro area and many other spots are also completely, permanently off limits.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ScentCone]

Nothing explains the most difficult part of the operation, public acceptance of something potentially noisy and dangerous

You mean, like a 5-ton brown diesel panel truck rolling into your driveway? That sort of noisy, dangerous thing?

Re:the main legit use i can see

[sonamchauhan]

Or rather have the drones *in* the delivery truck (where they can recharge). One problem though - this does not work for apartment units (well, unless Amazon does balcony delivery ;-)

If they *must* use drones, who not *wheeled* delivery drones that can identify a doorbell and 'knock' for permission, deliver and scurry back to the truck?

Air delivery is not sensible at all. Cue the celebrities getting unwanted, anonymous gifts by the thousands, all delivered by metallic whirlybirds.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[sonamchauhan]

http://www.news.com.au/lifesty...

To avoid unknown 5-ton trucks in your driveway, you can fence and gate. Will drones obey this?

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Slashdot Junky]

That big, brown truck is operated by a human and, thus, makes for the need to employ one. Society needs for business to need human labor, and moves like this one by Amazon is reducing this need. A side from this, a damn "intelligent" UAV isn't going to be as versitile as a human. Sure, the delivery drone isn't ever going to replace all delivery people. I'd rather it not replace any of them, so we can avoid losing yet more jobs.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[drinkypoo]

The FAA says no UAS activity within 5 miles of an airport.

No, no it does not. It says not without clearance, and even that rule didn't exist until 2014. Go forth and use google.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[JoeMerchant]

I'm sorry, I don't care what altitude you assign this thing - "under 55lbs" of airframe and high-energy density battery zipping along fast enough to cover 20 miles on a single charge doesn't sound like a lot of fun when it makes "accidental contact" with anything I care about.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Which isn't really relevant when talking about the legal status of flying.

.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ceoyoyo]

Why not? Most apartments have green space around them. The drone says "I'm 5 min out, go put out your Amazon logo SIFT target (tm)" and you pop downstairs with a chunk of cardboard to mark out the front lawn.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[FlyHelicopters]

There is a great deal of misunderstanding of the whole 400ft thing...

Way too many people have read one thing, somewhere, and run off into left field with it...

The FAA regulates airspace in this country, from the ground to outer space, period.

If you pickup in a helicopter, to just 5 feet, you're flying, you must have a pilot certificate, and you must be either in an airworthy aircraft, or on a maintenance test flight.

The airspace starts from the first foot.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[FlyHelicopters]

Note they have no legal constitutional ability to enforce this rule but they are doing so anyway and will arrest people regardless if they have FAA approval. Amazon won't be exempted.

New York City?

In any case, of course they have the legal authority to enforce it... They are the FAA and they regulate all airspace in the US from the ground to outer space, out to 3 miles (or 12, depending) from the coasts.

Check out CFR 91.1 and 91.119

The rules are simple, and not... at the end of the day, the FAA is chartered to regulate and control the air space in the USA, from one foot up to space.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Jack Griffin]

Vehicles over 3 tonne are prohibited in my street becasue I live near a school. So yeah, I can't see this one getting up.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[dwillden]

That is the only feasible option. The sheer traffic a purely drone based system would involve is staggering. Find your local UPS distro center, and watch how many trucks leave every morning. This time of year each of those trucks is carrying 700 or more packages and a good number of those packages are from Amazon.

Better yet get hired on as a seasonal driver and see how massive the operation is in your average metro area. I did last Christmas, at peak we were delivering over 70k packages a day, that was one of the three distribution centers serving the Salt Lake City Metro area. 210k packages flying out one flight at a time from that one complex. How is that not a nightmare waiting to happen. People just don't realize how much one vehicle can carry. And they will still need delivery drivers because the drone isn't made yet that will deliver some of the heavier and odd shaped items I delivered.

Maybe if the drone is one of two or three attached to each vehicle, hopping off to fly the 40 feet or so to the front step and then back to get the next package. And if the weather is compliant, that is. I delivered in heavy snow that I doubt any drone would handle well, and in winds that blew my hat off on one occasion. Personally I think this is a pipe dream, the sheer volume of flights that would be needed rule it out even without considerations for weather or weights above 55 lbs make it far less feasible than the current fleet of cargo vans and delivery drivers.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Dereck1701]

"from the ground to outer space, period"

And what is your source for this statement? Everything I've ever seen says that the FAA is responsible only for "navigable airspace", which the FAA itself defines as 500' AGL (except around airports where their claims are more extensive). And in any case courts have never really ruled where your property ends and "navigable airspace" begins, the only case I know of on point is United States v. Causby which put it somewhere above 83ft.

https://www.faa.gov/air_traffi...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:the main legit use i can see

[DrXym]

It's no accident that the range of the drone in the video is 15 miles. The typical major metropolitan area in the United States is about 30 miles across. One depot in the middle of the city, or two at opposite ends, and the vast majority of customers are accessible with no truck at all. That's also why the new drone is a VTOL airplane, complete with wings and a rear propeller. They were chasing that range, and wings was the way to do it.

Drones could probably service a strip mall business and the suburbs but it would be utterly useless in the middle of a city where people live and work in high density units. Besides that the place would be strung with wires, poles, trees, birds, cranes and other hazards. Then you've got flight restricted zones. And adverse weather events. And serious liability issues if a drone comes down on someone's head or gets hijacked / hacked / shot down.

I expect if / whenever such a service starts that someone in Amazon will have to personally vet and approve each delivery location for safety and suitability. Even then I wonder what the use of it is. Someone would have to be in desperate need of an item to pay whatever exorbitant charge goes with having it delivered by drone.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[DrXym]

Perhaps they've seen Uber ride roughshod over the law and have decided they'll do likewise. Fly the drones and then build a warchest to fight the legal actions until they get what they want.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[DrXym]

I expect most people would prefer the truck over something unexpectedly landing on their head.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[drinkypoo]

You mean, like a 5-ton brown diesel panel truck rolling into your driveway? That sort of noisy, dangerous thing?

To be fair, those are 1.5 ton trucks at most. UPS makes (or has made) their own custom Aluminum bodies.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[JoeMerchant]

The weight and fuel payload are entirely relevant when establishing the legal status of flying - if you're willing to hang your butt up in the sky with 5 gallons of gasoline or less (and certain restrictions on airframe, etc.), you are legally allowed to fly with no license or training whatsoever. The difference with drones is that the pilots literally have no skin in the game, and Amazon will doubtless be attempting to implement a "pilotless, fully automated" system so that any liability gets contested by their billions dollar backed legal team.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Anonymous Coward]

Buggy whip sales are down too. We need to act fast.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Holi]

Do they? In a city? Most of the apartment buildings I have lived at have had little or none green space.

Re: the main legit use i can see

[randallman]

Broken Window Fallacy

Re:the main legit use i can see

[TheRaven64]

I presume that this would be integrated with some kind of app on the receiver end. When the truck is dispatched (or, if the depot is in range, when the parcel is ready for direct dispatch), you'd get a message telling you the time window when it will be available. You then signal that you're ready to receive it and give some GPS coordinates. It's then dispatched and sends another message when it's a few hundred metres away. You then go outside (or stand on a balcony) and wait for it to be delivered directly to you. Once it's very close, it can use WiFi from your phone (send your MAC address to the drone and the SSID that you're associated with - or create an ad-hoc network if you're out of range and it can home in on you) to check that it's actually landing by the correct person. Then just tap the 'delivery received' button and it will fly away.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Delwin]

I wonder how you add to the federal geofencing database since drones are required to obey it.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[crow_t_robot]

It's a good thing that large, multi-ton passenger and cargo aircraft are not allowed to fly anywhere in the world then because they could fall out of the sky and scratch someone's Range Rover.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ScentCone]

To be fair, those are 1.5 ton trucks at most. UPS makes (or has made) their own custom Aluminum bodies.

OK then, you're right. Completely harmless.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ScentCone]

Yeah, try operating a commercial UAV at an airport or over Washington DC and see how long it takes for a federal knock on the door and a $10,000 fine per incident. You don't do that with your logo splashed on the side of your delivery vehicle and just hope nobody notices.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ScentCone]

It says not without clearance

Right. In advance, with a flight plan, and not BLOS. Remind me again how that's going to work on a package delivery to random addresses inside 30 minutes.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[FlyHelicopters]

You're confusing ownership of airspace with the right to fly aircraft within that airspace.

You might well, for various legal reasons, own the air up to 200ft above your land. That does NOT give you the right to fly a helicopter 190ft above your land without a pilot certificate.

It does give you the right to erect a 190ft tower on your land however.

This is where people seem to go off the rails. The two things are different. The FAA regulates flying things, stuff that leaves the ground.

Drones are flying things, the FAA can clearly regulate drones.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[FlyHelicopters]

You can jump all you like, because you're not an aircraft.

The FAA regulates aircraft, not human bodies, towers (to a point, they do have rules over lighting for towers over 200ft), or other surface objects.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[FlyHelicopters]

A few things...

An AC is just that, advisory... not regulatory... it is the FAA trying to make life easier for RC pilots, by giving them suggestions on how to operate so as to AVOID regulation in the first place.

There is also a key point in that AC:

"The aircraft is flown strictly for hobby or recreational use"

Amazon is neither, so the whole thing doesn't even apply to them.

Amazon's drones are going to be regulated, and soon, any other commercial drone is going to be as well. They have to be, their numbers will just keep growing.

General aviation didn't require a whole lot of rules either in the early days, there were so few people doing it. Even today there aren't THAT many planes, but there are enough that rules are required.

The time for regulations for drones has arrived.

As a side note: Yes, we all know that the $50 quad copter that you fly in your yard is not the issue here, even the FAA knows that. No one, anywhere, really cares about those.

It is the ones that go above the tree line, the ones that can fly to 200ft or more, the ones that you can fly beyond visual range, and the ones that you fly over OTHER people, that are the concern.

This:
http://www.amazon.com/UDI-U818...
Is not a concern

This:
https://youtu.be/Q4RRYiLItww?t...
Is... Watch how high it goes and how far it goes...

Those are going to end up regulated, they have to be, thousands of them will end up in the skies and we can either choose to regulate them now, or after they kill people.

The smart answer is now.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[FlyHelicopters]

You're confusing the right to build a building on your land with your right to fly an aircraft over your land.

You are correct about the fact that the FAA can't just tell you what you can and cannot build on your land.

But they can tell you where you can fly an aircraft.

Drones are not buildings, they are aircraft.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[DrXym]

I didn't say that. The implication of what I said is people can see the truck. It's in their field of vision, moves predictably and is therefore avoidable. A large chunk of airframe falling out of the sky is not in their field of vision. It is not predictable or avoidable.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[drinkypoo]

Right. In advance, with a flight plan

Why is this a problem? You can't file a flight plan electronically?

Re:the main legit use i can see

[JoeMerchant]

Multi-ton passenger and cargo jets are piloted by people who care (usually a great deal) whether or not they land safely. If a drone has a landing that it will not fly away from without a major overhaul, who really cares? The people that get hit when it returns to the ground, for starters.

Re: the main legit use i can see

[Slashdot Junky]

Broken Window Fallacy

While somewhat similar, not replacing the delivery guy with a robot isn't the same thing as protecting the window repairman by breaking windows. Now, one could argue that developing and installing windows equipped with non-breakable glass puts some window repairman out of work in a similar manner in the long-term. Unlike the delivery guy, the window repairman probably isn't just repairing windows. He likely is also installing, replacing through upgrades and as prompted by age, and maintaining windows much of the time. The delivery guy is doing one thing, delivering packages.

Some would argue that the out-of-work delivery guy can just be trained for and move into a role associated with the drone such as design, maintenance, sales, and logistical support. While it is true that some of them can move to jobs created by the drone roll-out, all won't be capable of learning and understanding what is needed. Plus, there is "never" a one-for-one job replacement as processes are automated. A big reason why businesses automate is to reduce costs through reduction of human labor. Big Business isn't likely to knowingly replace the cost of human-based delivery with an equal or greater cost associated with operating the delivery-by-drone program. With reduced costs, budgets may not even support the creation and existence of a job for every unemployed delivery guy that pays a livable, let alone, comperable wage.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[ScentCone]

Why is this a problem? You can't file a flight plan electronically?

And get the FAA to respond with your waiver in under 5 minutes? The point of these flights is the under-30-minute delivery. That includes handling the transaction, picking the product at the warehouse, getting it on board and in the air and several miles away. The FAA isn't built for waiving NFZ rules in minutes.

Regardless, you're ignoring the whole no-BLOS part of their regs. They require a certified PIC and a spotter with eyes on the vehicle the whole time. It's taken them years to decide about THOSE rules. Deciding to waive them will take years more if ever.

Re:the main legit use i can see

[Areyoukiddingme]

To be fair, those are 1.5 ton trucks at most. UPS makes (or has made) their own custom Aluminum bodies.

OK then, you're right. Completely harmless.

And silent. Don't forget silent.

Where I live there are no mail trucks

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> normal as seeing mail trucks on the road

Where I live, we have mailmen (or mailwomen) walking door to door. Mail trucks are usually parked several blocks away.

>> drones fly under 400 feet and weigh less than 55 pounds

Well that's good. I'm sure 55 pound weights dropped from 400 feet are harmless.

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me guess... you believe Amazon hates you and wants you to die?

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey, if there's money to be made killing that guy, Amazon is probably interested (at least a little).

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[AK Marc]

Where I lived, the mailman parked on the street, walked a loop, and ended up back at the truck, and drove it 500 ft to the next street, to repeat his 3000 feet loop along the next block. The truck was never on a block the mailman wasn't. In colder climes, the boxes were on the street, so the mailman doesn't leave their vehicle.

The solution would be more fun with spud guns and self driving cars. Shoot the packages the last 100 ft, and have the automated cars get into range.

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[Jack Griffin]

>> normal as seeing mail trucks on the road

Where I live, we have mailmen (or mailwomen) walking door to door.

And if I had a dollar for everytime some new gimmick made the claim of "soon this will be as normal as.." I'd be rich.
The Segway claimed something similar, and I very rarely see those things anywhere.

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[FatdogHaiku]

Hey, if there's money to be made killing that guy, Amazon is probably interested (at least a little).

This could give rise to a whole new tough guy threat...
"It would be a shame if something like a box of poorly selling books was to hit you in the head from 400 feet accelerating at 32.174 ft/s squared!"

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[XNormal]

>> drones fly under 400 feet and weigh less than 55 pounds

Well that's good. I'm sure 55 pound weights dropped from 400 feet are harmless.

A four ton delivery vehicle at 25 miles per hour is not exactly harmless, either. In assessing the overall impact, you take into account both the potential damage from an accident and the probability of such accidents. For example, the fact that said delivery vehicle is operated by a driver that has been on the road for many hours and makes frequent stops and that the drone is equipped with 8 redundant rotor/motors and no doubt many other redundant systems and failure management strategies from the planning of the flight path, monitoring of vehicle health and constant assessment of possible damage-minimizing crash locations at all times.

I believe the expected impact of such drones should be an overall reduction in the death, injury, property damage and environmental impact associated with delivering replacements for important items chewed by dogs.

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[thegarbz]

Well that's good. I'm sure 55 pound weights dropped from 400 feet are harmless.

More or less so than a 5 ton weight travelling horizontally at 60mph?

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[Holi]

If UPS is driving 60 mph in your neighborhood you might want to file a complaint. Speed limits around my house are 25mph.

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[PhoenixFlare]

Do you feel the same way about all other aircraft, many of whom weigh much more and travel at much higher altitude, with the potential to cause a lot more damage if they fall out of the sky?

Or automobiles, with which you have to trust that a generally unknown driver has: maintained their vehicle properly, knows the traffic laws, actually decides to *follow* the traffic laws, hasn't been drinking, isn't distracted by their cellphone, has decent vision, etc.

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[cyberchondriac]

Fun, sure. Imagine the damage claims though. Especially if it delivered a fragile item through a picture window. :D

Re:Where I live there are no mail trucks

[thegarbz]

I have a highway 2 streets away. How seriously will the government take my complain?

Re:Americans...why ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because your mom.

Re:Americans...why ?

[ganjadude]

they dont. regardless of what the media and this poster said

Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Frosty Piss]

This is just Amazon pandering for free publicity. There are many many reasons drone delivery will probably never happen, certainly not within many years.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

This is just Amazon pandering for free publicity. There are many many reasons drone delivery will probably never happen, certainly not within many years.

I don't know...properly done this could save a lot of gas and driving, and possibly speed up some delivery times. I don't think it'll ever be fully automated until homes have some sort of pre-arranged "target" or zone for automated drones to home in on, but for small items I think this could (will) eventually become a fairly common thing.

Load up the truck, drive to a central spot within range of X number of deliveries, and let the drones go. You might need human operators to guide them the last few feet to a proper drop off spot, then click a button for the drone to auto-return to the truck while the operator guides the next one in to its delivery.

With a pre-arranged "target" or drop zone for automated drones to use you wouldn't even need human operators for that. A small radio beacon or bar code or other target marker combined with GPS would allow for fully automated delivery.

What will really make or break this (in my opinion) is the financial metrics, i.e. is it profitable to use a drone delivery system? And my guess would be that yes, eventually it will be. Hell, it could be financially feasible right now I suppose. The max size/weight of the item will be a factor too, no doubt, but I can see it happening.

I have to admit, it would be kinda cool to order something and have it 20 or 30 minutes later.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Areyoukiddingme]

What will really make or break this (in my opinion) is the financial metrics, i.e. is it profitable to use a drone delivery system? And my guess would be that yes, eventually it will be. Hell, it could be financially feasible right now I suppose.

It's hard to tell with Amazon, since they're perfectly willing to do unprofitable things, but one supposes they have math that says it's in the ballpark, or they wouldn't continue sinking effort into it.

We know a few things about the finances of the idea. Electricity is cheap. Really cheap. Electric motors and batteries are really efficient. And automated flight is a real thing. That means little or no pilot attention for much of its journey. Judging by the video, their explicit goal is no pilot attention for any part of the journey, unless the vehicle cries for help. Which means the labor cost is cheap. That sounds like a trifecta to me.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Yep.

It would be fairly inexpensive to place a unique delivery ID beacon on every home that wanted drone delivery, and a designated drop-off spot would be easy to program in. For smaller items (say, under a couple of pounds) I can see where this delivery method would be enormously attractive to a hell of a lot of people.

I just ordered a couple of CO detectors from Amazon. They're light enough that a drone could drop them off within a given range (and that range will only increase with time). And I'd sure be happy getting them 30 minutes after ordering rather than the current 3 to 5 days it takes now.

So yeah, I think this will become a thing. Some details need to be worked out, but I see it happening within the next 5 to 10 years if there's sufficient interest (read: profitability). Possibly much sooner.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[ColdWetDog]

Or they could just drop them in the mail, like everything else. The additional manpower and energy used is trivial. I'd even wager that Amazon gets a nice bulk rate on it's packages.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Or they could just drop them in the mail, like everything else.

You're completely missing the point...this is about speed of delivery, not cost. Mail is slow. Even overnight is...well, overnight. 10 to 20 hours depending on when its ordered. Some people want it faster.

A lot of people would pay some reasonable premium to have some widget they ordered be in their hands in an hour versus overnight or 3 to 5 days from the time of ordering. And overnight shipping is very expensive regardless of how small the item may be.

Would a drone-delivered item be cheaper? Maybe, but it would almost certainly be faster, and that's what people want. That's what this is all about- getting something into a customer's hands as quickly as possible.

Would I pay the premium for a drone-delivered item? Maybe. It depends on how bad I want/need it and how much it would cost. But I'm guessing it'll be cheaper than an overnight delivery from FedEx or DHL.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[scdeimos]

It would be fairly inexpensive to place a unique delivery ID beacon on every home that wanted drone delivery, and a designated drop-off spot would be easy to program in.

Didn't watch the video, hey? Recipients placed a ~1x1-foot marker plate out on the lawn which the drone homed in on to land and release the package. Then they just picked up their package and the marker plate and headed back inside. I'm guessing that Amazon plans to mail these out to customers when they sign up to a premium delivery service.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[scdeimos]

Especially if you need any range, most hobby aircraft can only fly about 15 minutes off a battery, and then require hours of charging.

Maybe in the Ni-Cd and Ni-MH days. Most e-planes, e-helis and quads these days run off Li-Poly or similar batteries and most fast charge in under an hour. They're so light you can just add more to extend the range, but you don't because (a) they're often not cheap enough and (b) most hobby pilots have had enough flying after 10-20 minutes and probably need to yield the flight line to other (impatient) hobby pilots as well.

Assuming Amazon goes down the Li-Poly route they're either intending to have twice as many drones than they want to keep in the air at any one time, or they'll be employing humans/robots to swap over battery packs when drones return to the depot.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[scdeimos]

Yes, when you mistreat Li-Pos swelling and fire is the end result. I've seen it a few times. Can't speak for commercial gear but my e-planes and e-helis are quite well ventilated to keep the batteries cooled while in-flight. With the exception of my current-hungry hotliner (which typically pulls >150 amps on its 20 second climb outs) my batteries tend to be barely warm upon landing and when charging are cooled by a 100mm computer fan.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Forgefather]

I think that Amazon has also correctly identified that the two main barriers for people shopping online are the inability to verify the goods with your own eyes and the delay between your order and its arrival. This is why they cut a deal with the postal services to make them deliver Amazon packages on a Sunday.

Amazon is also pursuing a seamless shopping experience that facilitates impulse buying. This is the reason for the way their shopping cart is designed with as few clicks between the customer and purchase as possible. Instant delivery is just another way of making sure a customer doesn't have to think about their purchase before pulling the trigger.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Jack Griffin]

That sounds like a trifecta to me.

You missed the most important part of the puzzle, public approval, which IMO is a huge fail. There is no way this is ever going to be allowed in public airspace. The noise/visual pollution and saftey concerns is an unwinnable argument in this day and age.
And if by some miracle does get approved, as soon as some clown puts a 55lb bomb on one and delivers it to someone he hates, that'll be the end of them forever.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

Didn't watch the video, hey?

Of course not, isn't it part of the slashdot code not to read the article or watch the video?

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Gilgaron]

You could probably have something in hand faster than it'd take to go to the store with a system like they're trying to make.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[drinkypoo]

I'm guessing that Amazon plans to mail these out to customers when they sign up to a premium delivery service.

Or you could just print a QR code and staple or tape it down someplace. Maybe slip it into a plastic envelope. Then you could have one-time-markers that would help prevent spoofing.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[crow_t_robot]

Stop trying to bring back QR codes.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

With the type of delivery they're talking about (i.e. within 15 miles) why not use a bicycle courier? You could have your package within an hour or two

Because hiring people and paying them costs money. Employees get sick, they want to take time off, they want benefits, they quit, they can be unreliable, etc etc etc. A drone service wouldn't have any of those problems and would pay for itself after some number of deliveries.

Also, bicycling 15 miles from a warehouse to a drop off point would be a lot of trouble, not many couriers want to bike 100 miles a day in bad weather (hot or cold, rain, snow, fog, etc). They'd also have to contend with traffic. I don't know if it would be feasible to deliver by bicycle to a point 10 or 15 miles away.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[drinkypoo]

Stop trying to bring back QR codes.

QR codes never left, they just never made sense for a whole bunch of situations — especially since most phones seem to come without the ability to read a bar code. Why isn't that in the default camera app?

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Areyoukiddingme]

You missed the most important part of the puzzle, public approval, which IMO is a huge fail. There is no way this is ever going to be allowed in public airspace. The noise/visual pollution and saftey concerns is an unwinnable argument in this day and age.

Are you sure? They're both smaller and quieter than a delivery truck, and move faster, so they're in your way and in your awareness for less time. The FAA is already writing regulations that allow them in public airspace. In the face of regulatory approval, the inevitable lawsuits will have an uphill battle. Government lawyers will no doubt be instructed to employ every delaying tactic they know, which means the lawsuit will take half a decade or more. And by then, public acceptance will happen. They'll be familiar, and the familiar is always acceptable.

And if by some miracle does get approved, as soon as some clown puts a 55lb bomb on one and delivers it to someone he hates, that'll be the end of them forever.

Because the Unabomber's activities eradicated all postal delivery trucks, right? Pfft.

Nobody is going to put a 55lb bomb on an Amazon drone. They can't lift that much. Nobody is any more likely to put a 5lb bomb on an Amazon drone then they are to try to send one through the mail. In fact, it's considerably less likely. Amazon doesn't accept packages from the public. When Amazon succeeds in automating their warehouses (and they will), there will be no human involved at all in picking and delivering your package. So no bombs. And if some one tries to sneak in and load a bomb onto a drone, it will probably shut down the system and sound alarms all over the place, for safety reasons. Not because of the bomb. Because of the presence of a human in a fully automated warehouse.

Unless of course in the dystopian future, Amazon decides to change their policies, and start delivering bombs and munitions, special order. Then if it blows you up on your lawn, it's because you were an idiot and ordered nitroglycerin. You should have ordered the C4, dum-dum.

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Jack Griffin]

Nobody is going to put a 55lb bomb on an Amazon drone. They can't lift that much.

RTFA, Amazon are designing Drones with 55lb load capacity.

When Amazon succeeds in automating their warehouses (and they will), there will be no human involved at all in picking and delivering your package.

A Terrorist doesn't send the package via the Amazon warehouse, they use their own.
You can't take a water bottle on a plane and you think a 55lb capacity drone will be publicly acceptable?

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Areyoukiddingme]

RTFA, Amazon are designing Drones with 55lb load capacity.

Who does that? Anyway, I was talking about the one they actually have working in the video, which most definitely doesn't have such a high capacity.

You can't take a water bottle on a plane and you think a 55lb capacity drone will be publicly acceptable?

What makes you think the public had any chance to express an opinion about water bottles on planes?

Re:Free Publicity For Amazon! Yay!

[Jack Griffin]

What makes you think the public had any chance to express an opinion about water bottles on planes?

Each time someone hands over a bottle at airport security they have the opportunity to express an opinion. Most choose not to, which is why it still in place.
Democracy doesn't always come with an invitation.

Re:Americans...why ?

[Noah Haders]

we just like knowing that we can if we want to. Remember, the definition of a government is nothing more than an organization with the monopoly on force.

Has to be better than USPS

[reboot246]

Amazon has been in bed with the devil for a couple of years now. Nearly everything I order comes by USPS - the slowest, least reliable delivery service on Earth. The Post Office doesn't seem to understand that this is their last best chance to stay relevant and possibly get out of the red. Nope, they're sticking to their old ways - yesterday's technology delivering your packages tomorrow (or next week).

Drones are still in the earliest stage of development, so there's no telling how they will fare in a few years. Maybe they will take over most deliveries, maybe not.

Re:Has to be better than USPS

[ColdWetDog]

Huh? USPS isn't terribly fast (but you can wait an extra day or two for that toilet paper, yes?) but it is reliable. More reliable than a drone trying to land in 30 mph crosswinds with rain. The entire world does not consist of Southern California.

Re:Has to be better than USPS

[rsborg]

Amazon has been in bed with the devil for a couple of years now. Nearly everything I order comes by USPS - the slowest, least reliable delivery service on Earth.

This is in direct opposition to my experience.

The Post Office doesn't seem to understand that this is their last best chance to stay relevant and possibly get out of the red. Nope, they're sticking to their old ways - yesterday's technology delivering your packages tomorrow (or next week).

Huh? Oh I see - your experience of their service is essentially filtered by your dogma (that the post office as part of the "government" is not hip enough). Keep in mind, that the USPS as a private entity that's highly controlled by Congressional edicts and orders (like this one mandating that they essentially have to run in debt to pay retirements for employees not even hired yet [1]. If you have an issue with USPS maybe you should take it up with your representative.

Another thing you have to keep in mind, is that the USPS actually fulfills a lot of orders for UPS/FedEx - UPS/Fedex simply can't compete with the USPS for hard-to-reach areas, whereas the USPS has mandates to do so, and so has found a way to do it. [2]

[1] http://thinkprogress.org/econo...
[2] http://www.wsj.com/articles/u-...

Re:Has to be better than USPS

[Actually, I do RTFA]

best chance to stay relevant and possibly get out of the red. Nope, they're sticking to their old ways

Well, according to most accounting standards and GAPP, they're in the black now. It's only a way of accounting for pensions that no other entity, public or private, uses that makes them look in the red. Congress forces them to use this bizarre method.

THey also saved some tens of billions of dollars for a modernization effort. Congress literally took it away, and used it to finance the Bush tax cuts.

Re:Has to be better than USPS

[DogDude]

It's funny that you're suggesting that a government good should be profitable, but a private company doesn't have to.

Re:Has to be better than USPS

[wkwilley2]

Indeed, I order more things from Amazon than any other E-retailer combined and the majority of my purchases come through UPS. Sometimes, small items will come through USPS, but it's very infrequent.

and yes, it is far better than USPS. As far as I'm concerned, Fedex is the devil around here, they can't even afford branded trucks, they all run around in unmarked budget rental trucks, it's just embarassing.

Re:Has to be better than USPS

[Holi]

USPS is hardly "government funded", The USPS is funded by the sale of postage.

editors ftw

[fisted]

honestly the though of them buzzing around

[looks at editors with a blank expression]

Re:editors ftw

[Anonymous Coward]

There were no squiggly red lines, what's your problem?

Re:editors ftw

[thegarbz]

[looks at editors with a blank expression]

Thankyou for your feedback. Unfortunately we're unable to make our editors spellcheck because someone has marked the timothy script source code read only and we don't know the password.

I'm closing this bugtracker. #WONTFIX.

Time to invest in hard hats

[quantaman]

Hardware fails, drones will fall from the sky, and no one seems to be discussing this. If they fly over the roads they'll fall in traffic and cause accidents, if they fly over the sidewalks they'll hit pedestrians and cause serious injury. I'm sure the hardware is reliable but I don't think people will have a lot of tolerance for drone related injuries, is the tech really so reliable that they could be deployed large-scale without falling drones becoming a concern?

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[mschuyler]

Same is true of airplanes and the same objections were raised when they were new.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[sumdumass]

Here is something to think about as far as traffic goes. In several large cities where road speed is 55mph or higher, the overpasses now have chain link fence over the roadway because people have thrown bricks, rocks, and other objects over the side to be hit by traffic whizzing by. Several deaths have been attributed to this. Something as small as a 5lbs brick can crash through a windshield , the person sitting on the other side, and sometimes more.

What I'm getting at is this won't be just a scratch on the hood or bruises if it goes down in traffic. It can be lethal without much effort.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[Githaron]

No matter what we do they will fail. However, they can be made to fail safe and hopefully infrequently. For example, drone designs and flight algorithms that ensure a controlled landing in the event of a motor failure.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[quantaman]

Same is true of airplanes and the same objections were raised when they were new.

And we don't have major airports in the downtown core of major cities for partly that reason.

But even the cheapest airplanes are extremely expensive and contain at least one pilot who really doesn't want to die. If your plane is getting to the state where it might fall out of the sky you repair or retire it.

But say you have a fleet of 5 year old drones. You'll probably get another 3-4 years out of most before they fail completely so it's a waste of money to throw them out and buy new ones. Instead you'll just run them into the ground until they die, sure the threat of lawsuits might keep them well maintained but that's not the same guarantee as airplanes.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[mobby_6kl]

No, we don't have airports in city centers because airports are enormous and noisy.

As usual, the whole "drones will fall on my head" thing is luddite horseshit based on little to no evidence from the real world.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[Actually, I do RTFA]

And earlier this year, a private airplane crash landed on the belt around Atlanta, so it does happen. There will be more drones flights than airplanes. Airplanes have extensive and expensive maintenance between flights. Airports are not in downtown areas. Airplanes also have high costs of construction, extensive backups, independent reivew and assessment of their construction and huge deisge budgets.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[quantaman]

No, we don't have airports in city centers because airports are enormous and noisy.

For years Edmonton had a municipal airport close to the downtown used mostly by small planes, even with the small planes there were height restrictions on the buildings in the downtown. Now this is much more a concern with landing and takeoff rather than flying at altitude, but landing and takeoff are dangerous and that's a factor they consider.

As usual, the whole "drones will fall on my head" thing is luddite horseshit based on little to no evidence from the real world.

I'm not even sure how to respond to this, I offered specific reasoning based on economics and the reality of hardware failures and you just called it "luddite horseshit based on little to no evidence from the real world". You didn't even offer me an actual point to counter.

Did you mean the part where there will be lots of drones in the sky above cities? That's a question of economics and how the usages develop, I don't think assuming a big market is "luddite horseshit".

What about thinking that some will fall out of the sky? Surely the drones in Amazon's fleet won't last forever, how do you expect them to be pulled from service and recycled? Don't you think there's going to be companies looking at the slightly less reliable drones and thinking "rather than buying a new one I'll accept a 0.1% this drone will spontaneously fall out of the sky in the next month".

Or maybe you think the actual falling won't be a problem. If it's a low population suburb you're probably fine. If it's a downtown during rushhour, it might be pretty hard to find a safe place to drop a 20kg object.

If you're going to call something "luddite horseshit" then please be specific about what the actual horseshit is.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[ceoyoyo]

I hear a 5000 lb delivery truck crashing through your windshield can also turn a good day into a bad day.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[kheldan]

Hardware fails, drones will fall from the sky..

This is all Amazon trying to create publicity for themselves. It'll never really happen.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[kheldan]

As usual, the whole "drones will fall on my head" thing is luddite horseshit based on little to no evidence from the real world.

I'm not even sure how to respond to this..

You don't need to respond to it. Anyone who immediately turns to name-calling, mistakenly thinking it somehow validates their 'point', isn't worth the trouble to even listen to in the first place. Furthermore, that guy, whoever he is, is just another child (millennial, maybe?) who likely has never had anything bad happen to them their entire lives ('bad things happen to OTHER people!') and just can't imagine anything actually going wrong. They don't understand that technology can and does fail, and that where human safety and lives are at stake, you can't afford to just hope things work like you want them to, you have to take precautions.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[kheldan]

However, they can be made to fail safe and hopefully infrequently

I'm sorry, but I don't think you've ever designed any sort of technology in your entire life, let alone aircraft, if you think that way. You cannot control random failures. Prime example: Battery suddenly fails completely. No 'algorithm' can function in a system with NO POWER. Drone drops like a rock, maybe on a car, maybe on someone's head. I can't say it enough: When human safety and lives are at stake you cannot assume things will always work and just hope for the best, you have to take every precaution, both in design and in operation. That's why this sort of thing really isn't going to see the light of day: you can't guarantee with even a reasonable degree of predictability that nobody will have a drone fall on them. This isn't even touching on the subject of things like property damage. Really, it's all a publicity stunt.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[flux]

I would expect the same as well, but these could also employ safety gadgets such as parachutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[flux]

One word: parachutes. They should take the edge off from lethal to just wounding, depending on the size of the parachute.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?... - and this is just a hobbyist solution.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[sumdumass]

Sure it can. What is your point? I hope it isn't something stupid like a drone or a brick has more control falling from the sky. My point was that it is not some trivial thing. Especially when speed and momentum is involved from the object that ends up hitting it.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[sumdumass]

Unless the parachute can steer it away, I'm not sure it would help much. The speed and momentum that would cause most of the damage would be from the vehicle striking it.

I'm replying from my phone with piss poor reception so i didn't get a chance to watch the video you linked to. Sorry if that already answered my point.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[flux]

A parachute would keep it in the upright position and hopefully collide with softer parts in the bottom of the drone.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[neilo_1701D]

Hardware fails, drones will fall from the sky, and no one seems to be discussing this

It's not a quadcopter; it's more a VTOL plane. If a motor fails on a quad; well there's a splat roughly directly below it. But a VTOL plane... a plane has wings and an ability to glide. If a motor fails, there are enough smarts nowadays in flight controllers to detect that and take action. Supposing it was cruising at 400', it could conceivably glide to a pre-determined safe spot.

Maybe.

Re: Time to invest in hard hats

[crow_t_robot]

What exactly are those safety designs in something like a Cessna 172? How does the design handle the pilot having a stroke, heart attack or other type of incapacitating event? Tell me when drones can do damage like this:

http://i.imgur.com/tPb3WfL.jpg

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[crow_t_robot]

Those cases of drones falling out of the sky and killing people is considered "acceptable losses" here in America for the sake of unchecked consumerism just like we consider all the homicides and mass shootings "acceptable losses" because FREEDOM.

Re:Time to invest in hard hats

[Githaron]

Barring physical damage, I have never heard of a battery suddenly failing. Even if they did, you just have two smaller batteries instead of one bigger one. Ultimately, the goal is not perfect non-failure but rather safe-enough given the benefits as judged by society. Just like cars.

Re:Americans...why ?

[mschuyler]

Because drones flying over your house are an invasion of privacy. They are inanimate objects, so no killing involved, and there might be something cool in the box. Don't want it shot down? Don't fly over private property.

Next year: Prime Air sells record # of helmets

[Rick in China]

I suppose it's time to invest in head-protection companies. Nothing more futuristic sounding than drones dropping off discounted underwear, but we all know these will end up killing people - directly or not.

So this is what Clarkson's doing now

[ickleberry]

Tis quite a fall from grace, you can tell by his voice that he doesn't feel even 1% of the passion for Amazamazon drones as he does for tearing through the winding roads of Wales in All-British V12 petrol-drinking Coupes

Re:So this is what Clarkson's doing now

[towermac]

Can't he still do that?

Re:So this is what Clarkson's doing now

[GrandCow]

Fall from grace? He, Hammond, and May are working on a new motoring show currently with a bigger budget than they ever could have hoped when they were working with the BBC. They probably all got a nice pay raise as well. There's probably a few clauses in the contract that they need to do some Amazon based commercials, but who cares?

Re:So this is what Clarkson's doing now

[AmiMoJo]

It will be really interesting to see if the new show is popular, seeing as you have to have an Amazon Prime subscription and compatible device to watch it. No matter how much money they throw at it, how many people either already have or will be willing to throw £80 at it for a subscription?

The BBC show is scheduled to start again next year in May, and will probably also fail. Only Evans confirmed so far, my guess is that the co-presenters will be weekly guests and that overall it will suck worse than his inexplicably popular morning radio show.

Well, I for one...

[ClickOnThis]

...am surprised we haven't seen any "overlords" posts yet.

This seems like cool technology for delivery of expedited packages and take-out food, but I'm not looking forward to junk-mail drones.

Noise pollution

[pubwvj]

If they're buzzing around they're going to be like having snowmobiles and dirt bikes overhead. We already have too much noise pollution and don't need more, especially low flying drones.

Re:Noise pollution

[MikeDataLink]

"they're going to be like having snowmobiles and dirt bikes overhead".

They run on electric motors and batteries. Not gas engines. I have one. They are very quiet.

Re:Noise pollution

[thegarbz]

You mean like the sound of a swarm of bees when they are REALLY CLOSE?

Most drones are silent when more than about 15m away. And this is a plane, not a quad, they are even quieter.

Re:Noise pollution

[drinkypoo]

They may not even be using LiPos. The energy density of Li-Ions is very good these days. Lots of people are apparently powering their 250-size quads with LiIons, and maybe even some 450s. I aim to try powering my 450 with a 3S2P Li-Ion pack, but I haven't come up with a replacement for my USB power bank yet and there's where all my 18650s are right now. The ESCs will support it, and I think I can get enough current out of it. If I can come up with three more cells and two more servos I'll have everything I need to build another foam plane, too... save for the $11 motor/esc/prop combo

Re:Noise pollution

[dcw3]

Can we ban leaf blowers while we're at this?

Re:Noise pollution

[ScentCone]

So, the ones that are certified and are in use commercially right now and have been for years and don't cost more than a manned aircraft - those are imaginary?

Re:Noise pollution

[ScentCone]

If you were handy, we'd do a little test. I'll take four different size multi-rotors up to 400' when you're not looking, and then we'll see how well you can tell where they are, which direction they're going, or if you can even hear them at all.

Then, I'll bring one in for a quick vertical landing at the same time a UPS diesel panel truck rolls up next to you to make a delivery, and you can tell me where the drone is, using only your ears.

You're speaking without experience, or deliberately trolling.

Re:Noise pollution

[pubwvj]

"electric motors are quiet"

That's a myth. I have some. They're still vibrating the air which is audible. I don't want them flying over me or my property, especially at low altitudes.

Re:Noise pollution

[pubwvj]

Sorry but you're wrong.

I have electric motor aircraft. I know how right I am.

Re:Noise pollution

[ScentCone]

Sorry but you're wrong.

I have electric motor aircraft. I know how right I am.

I have a range of electric aircraft, and actually operate them in situations ranging from dead silent to, say, typical suburban background noise levels. I not only know how right I, I have explicitly researched this - first hand, in practice, with uninformed test subjects doing the listening - in order to be comfortable saying what I'm saying (because I also say it to customers, since it's important to some of them). I have large octos that are noisy, hexes that can be, and quads that range from annoying to practically inaudible until they're only feet away. You're entitled to your own opinion, but not your own empirically observed facts.

Re:Noise pollution

[pubwvj]

"You won't hear these at all. The noise is mostly high frequency and attenuates quickly."

Except some of us, like myself, have very good high frequency hearing and do hear these. They're too loud.

Perhaps part of the problem is that people like you don't know what quiet is really like out in the sticks. You've become so inured to noise in your urban environments that a little more doesn't bother you.

Or you have become deafened by all the noise pollution around you.

Or both.

Re:Noise pollution

[pubwvj]

Please.

You can't take the sky!

[TapeCutter]

Oh, wait...

Re:You can't take the sky!

[ColdWetDog]

You still have the space between your couch and the roof.....

Re:Americans...why ?

[silas_moeckel]

We dont, outside of some crackpots nobody is going to believe it's spying on them etc. Outside of landing and takeoff it's not loitering around. They should be nearly fully automated no human is looking at any video feed. Rather different than your neighbor flying a drone and peeping over your fence.

Re:Americans...why ?

[ColdWetDog]

Why do Americans want to shoot anything/everything ?

Practice. Today it's an Amazon drone, tomorrow Donald Trump. Gotta be ready.

Re:Americans...why ?

[ageoffri]

We don't and the editor attempted to make an unfunny political statement.

Re:Americans...why ?

[pepty]

So for both Amazon's and your neighbor's drones: how about limiting drones transiting private residential property to an altitude of 200-400 feet?

Timing

[speedplane]

Amazon releases a major announcement about a speculative but futuristic technology they are developing 12 hours before their biggest sale of the year. Coincidence?

Re:Timing

[phantomfive]

Happened last year, too.

Re:Timing

[thegarbz]

Yes Coincidence. It's not like Amazon haven't had almost monthly announcements about their work with drones, and consumers couldn't give a shit about it.

Re:My new hobby

[GrandCow]

6. Go to jail when the company puts streaming cameras and very precise GPS locators on each drone. Sure you may get 1 or 2, hope the jail time is worth it.

Trees and powerlines?

[RubberDogBone]

How are they going to work this with trees? Most of my property has huge trees all over it and the main area that doesn't have trees does have several different sets of power lines. We have normal ones and high-voltage lines above them on much taller poles.

It would be challenging for human standing outside to get a drone in or out of here, or indeed to most of my neighbor's homes.

And in my case, I have a overhang porch with wood columns. Amazon would have to navigate under that porch to put the packages near my door, but in any case they'd have no choice because the only other option would be dropping it in the yard and no, they can't do that.

And if all that wasn't enough, I live within six miles of an airport so Amazon can't fly here anyway. Which is a shame. As a Prime subscriber, I use Amazon a lot. But lately the USPS has decided my address is undeliverable despite being the same address for close to 20 years. Lost two packages from Amazon on Saturday because of this. The boxes are going back to Amazon and the items are now out of stock so I can't even reorder. Assuming my address is working the next time.

Re:Trees and powerlines?

[jhecht]

Home phone, cable and power wires are small enough in diameter to be hard for radar to detect, so avoidance depends on knowing their locations. That can be deduced reasonably well from pole and tower locations, but that data may not yield precise cable heights, so drones will have to leave safety margins. So unless drones avoid cities with overhead utilities, they're likely to more power failures than drunks and distracted drivers.

Re:Trees and powerlines?

[ScentCone]

Not counting your airport problem, it's quite possible that properties like yours will simply be on the "Sorry, we can't deliver to your address by this mechanism" list. That's going to be true of millions and millions of residences. Probably MOST residences. This will be more useful for exurbs, and for deliveries to places like corporate office parks, hospitals, or other spots that might need rush deliveries and have more reliably plausible LZs. Logistics are likely to be case by case.

Patents

[Dr. Evil]

The patents may be extraordinarily lucrative.

Bollocks aside..

[Goonie]

The most interesting thing from this video is that Amazon is playing with tiltrotor concepts for their delivery drone design.

A Potential Flaw...

[Irate Engineer]

Hmmm...I could see some nefarious person or organization painting an Amazon logo on their drone, loading it up with 55 lbs of plastic explosive/ anthrax spores/[insert mayhem causing substance or object here], and flying it off to fuck up someone's day. It would look "legit", as you don't have to mock up a delivery truck to put the package on someone's doorstep.

It will be interesting when a bunch of senators and congressmen suddenly get packages from "Amazon" delivered to their doorstep - all at once.

And if you're wondering, I'm still not a terrorist, you damned infidels.

Re:A Potential Flaw...

[Jack Griffin]

Hmmm...I could see some nefarious person or organization painting an Amazon logo on their drone,

Why would they need an Amazon logo? This technology already exists for people not interest in following rules. Nothing Amazon is doing changes this.

Re:A Potential Flaw...

[Irate Engineer]

Jack - that wooshing sound you just heard is the sound of my OP flying over your head. Don't be frightened.

I'm sorry, but you're clearly not cut out for doing (or blocking) nefarious deeds.

Re:A Potential Flaw...

[AmiMoJo]

I was actually thinking that it would be more efficient if instead of having a letterbox people had a kind of funnel into which packages could be dropped. Ideally on the roof, but could be at ground level. The drone wouldn't have to land, just drop its payload into the funnel, which would have a curve at the bottom to slow the package down and prevent damaging it any more than the postie does.

Secondary revenue stream

[ebonum]

You think phone apps make money selling the data they collect from unsuspecting users? Think about how much data Amazon will collect flying over people's backyards with high resolution sensors.

Re:Americans...why ?

[Irate Engineer]

We didn't used to, but after two world wars with Europe and Asia causing shit and shooting us first, we decided to declare open season on...everything. When in doubt, shoot it. When still in doubt, shoot it again.

Lack of roads

[Etherwalk]

The main legit use I can see would be to have this drone alone side of the delivery trucks. meaning the trucks get to keep driving, the drones when they get near the correct location grab the box and drop it on the doorstep. Less wasted gas due to keeping the truck moving, and more deliveries for the same reason.

There are plenty of places where roads are unreliable. There are even places where the delivery truck may be pulled over by men with guns.

Re:Lack of roads

[msauve]

"There are plenty of places where roads are unreliable. There are even places where the delivery truck may be pulled over by men with guns."

...and Amazon offers 2-day Prime shipping to those places?

nice movie plot threat

[Goonie]

Given that we've just had a couple of high profile examples of actual terrorist attacks, you'll note a lack of:

• drones
• plastic explosive
• any other high tech device

You will note an oversupply of:

• firearms
• fanatics prepared to use them

Re:nice movie plot threat

[Irate Engineer]

Given that we've just had a couple of high profile examples of actual terrorist attacks, you'll note a lack of:

• drones
• plastic explosive
• any other high tech device

You will note an oversupply of:

• firearms
• fanatics prepared to use them

Yes? I also noted the lack of airliners and box knives as well. What's your point?

terrorist delivery vehicle

[tchdab1]

Maybe off topic, but I've wondered why some misinformed and mislead idiot hasn't yet used one of these things to fly explosive ordinance into a large crowd of people.

Re:terrorist delivery vehicle

[serviscope_minor]

Maybe off topic, but I've wondered why some misinformed and mislead idiot hasn't yet used one of these things to fly explosive ordinance into a large crowd of people.

A drone packed with explosives is called a "cruise missile". They've been used to fly into groups of people for many decades. Granted by the armed forces (frequently misinformed and mislead), but it's the morning and I feel like being deeply pedantic. So there.

Re:terrorist delivery vehicle

[raind]

or military delivery vehicle: https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/find-fix-finish/

Re:Americans...why ?

[Lije Baley]

Quiet!!! If the Europeans find out, they'll invade, and we'll all end up having to eat soft cheese and wear form-fitting track suits!

Re:Americans...why ?

[ganjadude]

not form fitting track suits!!!!!

Re: Americans...why ?

[swillden]

This anonymous is certainly smart and is most definitely not a retard. Keep going you not-a-retard.

That's a comeback worthy of Stuart Bloom.

Re:Europeans Why?

[alantus]

Why do Eurpeans insist on saying 'Americans' when they really mean the USA. America consists of two continents and consists of 55 individual and seperate countries. Yet the Eurpeans who pride themselve on their knowlege of geography and being smarter that 'Americans' all insist on calling the USA, America. I do not understand this.

Its not only Europeans, some people in the USA use the term "America" and "USA" interchangeably out of ignorance or perhaps laziness.

But yes, the worst offenders are Europeans. You can find this even in important magazines, such as The Economist.

Tech theatre

[Tough Love]

This drone design is a pathetic pretense from end to end. For starters, consider the wing loading, it will be off the end of the scale. Look at the eensy weensy props. You can get anything to fly if you put a big enough engine on it, so... gigantic engines, right? Not. And whacking big battery to slide that aerodynamic turd through 15 miles of atmosphere... nowhere to be seen. To cap it off, feast your eyes on the excess of vertical stabilizer and the table-saw grade longitudinal struts. Oh, how about the bomb bay doors? Right at home on a B-52 I'd say.

Nice comic relief Amazon.

Re:Tech theatre

[Tough Love]

Aerodynamically, a bit worse than this I think.

Re:Americans...why ?

[ScentCone]

Why do Americans want to shoot anything/everything ?

No, the question is why does everyone else feel the need to keep that meme alive? Is it to make themselves feel better about having given away their own ability to defend themselves? There are plenty of places around the world where people go and spend an hour on the trap and skeet ranges. It's like bowling or golf. Why do all of the Germans, Swedes, French, Italians, Japanese, British, Russian, Brazilian, Spanish, Chinese, Australian, Latvian, and everyone else who do that want to shoot everything? Or is that maybe not really a reasonable characterization, as it turns out?

Re:Americans...why ?

[ScentCone]

Because drones flying over your house are an invasion of privacy

Actually no, no they're not. You might have an argument if the machine is being operated literally feet above your house, or below your treetops. But traversing the airspace above your house isn't any more invasion of your property than is driving by it with a car. Do you feel that your privacy is being invaded when a traffic reporting Cessna flies over? No? Why not? Be specific.

Re:Americans...why ?

[CaptainDork]

Yeah, for reference, look at the wonderful consequences of the US-induced Arab Spring and the lack of stability in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Egypt, Syria, Iran, Turkey ... and the success of ISIS and al-Qaeda..

400ft - 55lbs

[FlyHelicopters]

Amazon said its drones fly under 400 feet and weigh less than 55 pounds."

There are several issues with that, the first being that 55lbs from 400ft is a lot of mass traveling really fast...

But assuming they somehow make them perfectly reliable, you have the issue of other air traffic and obstacles that aren't on charts under 400ft.

Yes, yes, someone will quote the rules about altitude and airplanes. Someone forgot that helicopters exist, and that airplanes do sometimes fly lower as well.

A lot of light helicopters do not have any technology to avoid other traffic other than the Mk1 eyeball, and an Amazon drone may well not see one in time either.

It'll be interesting to see, but given many years of flying experience in helicopters, I shudder to think the first time a 55lb drone hits a helicopter. A big helicopter (think S-76) would probably survive it, a Robinson R22/44 would likely not.

Re:Americans...why ?

[Noah Haders]

How did so many Russians die in WWII? What strategic decisions were made that put so many lives at risk?

Re:Americans...why ?

[dave420]

The massive amount of people killed each year by guns probably has something to do with it. It's a bit more than a meme if it's demonstrably true.

If you think your guns let you defend yourself against the government, you really need some help.

Nice

[nospam007]

Since they will hardly be able to ring my bell, I'd like to see a Santa-Bot that drops gift packages down the chimney.

Signature Required

[tsqr]

My wine shipments require a signature for delivery. How will a drone do that? When a high-value item is expected and I'm not going to be home, I can leave a note for the driver to drop the package at a neighbor's house. How will a drone do that?

Re:Europeans Why?

[Holi]

Because that is what citizens of the United States of America are called. It is what they have been called historically and it is what they will continue to be called. In fact we are the only country with America in our name.

Re:Americans...why ?

[Holi]

South America is not a country idiot.

Try it in a war zone first

[Crowd Computing]

Since commercial drone technology isn't supposed to be top secret, the drones could also be used to deliver food and medicine to people caught in a war zone. Of course, there's the flip side that such technology can also be used for military drops.

Re:Americans...why ?

[TheRaven64]

The world also needs less stupid people, though making people less stupid by blowing them up is probably not going to work very well.

Fantastic for package theft

[Beerdood]

So, instead of having at least a chance of being home to answer the door with a human driver knocking / ringing the doorbell - the drone is going to drop off the package on my doorstep with no notice? Sure, I suppose you could integrate some app / notification system on a smartphone or something - but that's not going to help if I don't have a smartphone (or it's not around when the package is delivered).

Re:Europeans Why?

[amRadioHed]

America does not consist of two continents. There are two continents, North America and South America and the people who reside on them are North and South Americans. America by itself doues not refer to a continent.

Re:Americans...why ?

[ScentCone]

The massive amount of people killed each year

You mean the number that is far lower than the number of people killed through preventable accidents in hospitals? Or in car accidents? That sort of thing? The number that's been going steadily down for 30 years? The number half of which are suicides? The murders that are highly concentrated in just a handful of some sections of some urban areas that also feature high numbers of knifings, beatings, and other kinds of murders? Take those few urban areas (run, every one of them, for decades by progressive lefty legislatures/councils and executives) out of stats, and the murder rate in general (to say nothing of those that happened to involve the use of a firearm) are below 16 other modern western democracies including in Europe. In other words, "Americans" don't want to shoot anything/everything, but there are some urban areas in the US where politcal correctness and lefty politics have cultivated acute local crime problems. These are also the areas with the most draconian gun control laws, of course.

If you think your guns let you defend yourself against the government, you really need some help.

Which comment of mine are you replying to, exactly? Please be specific.

Re:Americans...why ?

[crow_t_robot]

The Russians were the reason Nazi Germany fell and the Japanese only surrendered because they didn't know that we did not have a third or more bombs.

Re:Not so fast, cowboy!

[FlyHelicopters]

You make it sound like you can't throw a paper dart without a licence from the FAA.

A paper dart is not an aircraft, so the FAA wouldn't regulate it.

The FAA has always had the power to regulate most RC aircraft, they just have not done so because the reality is there actually AREN'T that many of them. Not the sort the FAA cares about.

The $50 flying quad copter you bought at the mall that goes up to 50 feet? Yea, no one cares about that, not even the FAA.

The $1,500 quad copter that goes up to 500ft and 5 miles away out of sight? Yep, the FAA cares about that and those will soon be regulated.

The trick is figuring out where the line gets drawn. Believe it or not, some smart people work at the FAA and they are not all idiots, like some would have you believe.

I know multiple people there, I've worked with them before, they can be quite reasonable, if you're being reasonable in return.

Amazon is going to have to show how this does not cause a hazard to air traffic or people on the ground. I'll be interested to see how they do that, because for the life of me, I can't imagine that happening.

A Robinson R22 helicopter would likely not survive the impact from a 55lb drone flying at 50 knots, and they don't have equipment to avoid the drone other than the Mark 1 eyeball (and such a drone would be hard to see until way too late).

Yes, the R22 has Mode C transponder, but it isn't enough for traffic avoidance purposes.

Re:Noise Levels?

[Fieryphoenix]

That's my main concern. I do not want to step out into my backyard and be able to hear drone noises all day, not even barely.

Re:Americans...why ?

[jakimfett]

Anything but the form fitting track suits!