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After seven years of waiting, Amazon has finally received FAA approval to take to the skies with its fleet of Prime Delivery drones.
Is it a bird… is it a plane? No, it’s that salad spinner mum ordered from Amazon Prime. This week, Amazon has finally been granted approval by the US Federal Aviation Administration to begin trials for its fleet of commercial drones in the States.
After seven years of tech prep, the e-commerce giants will finally get a chance to practice flying the drones out in public and iron out any logistical kinks before a potential full-scale release in the coming years, according to Bloomberg.
However, much like UPS – which has developed a delivery drone of its own – Amazon has only navigated the FAA’s initial layer of red tape and is now fully dependent on the agency drawing up a list of drone specific regulations that don’t yet exist.
Currently governed by patchwork guidelines mostly pertaining to ‘occupied aerial vehicles’ with onboard staff and passengers, the door to a mainstream launch for autonomous drone services is at best ajar, and more purpose-built regulations will need to be established. Luckily for Amazon, that’s set to happen before the year’s end.
What we do know is that Amazon is confident its drone of choice – the hexagon-shaped MK27 – is more than capable of making deliveries up to 7.5 miles from dispatch points, and can carry packages weighing as much as five pounds to their buyers in under 30 minutes. It also has built-in sensors which will allow it to touch down without severing a power line or squishing the neighbour’s cat.
Declining to officially reveal when and where drone tests will begin taking place, Amazon is expected to begin testing right away. With Covid-19 steering consumers more toward online purchases and away from physical shopping, Bezos and the analytics crew in Seattle will be waiting to capitalise on any potential opportunities that come their way.
