By Dailymail
- Amazon boss Jeff Bezos announced firm completed first drone delivery in Cambridge on December 7
- Amazon Air debut took just 13 minutes from order to delivery destination, with drone travelling at 400ft
- Drones will only be used during daylight and in sunny conditions with ice or rain grounding them
- Amazon Air is launched amid safety concerns with number of near-misses involving aircraft and drone pilots
Amazon Air has made its first delivery by drone and claimed it dropped off a package in just 13 minutes.
The drone left one of the firm’s bases in Cambridge and dropped off an Amazon Fire TV box and a bag of popcorn to a customer in the same county, although Amazon has yet to confirm how far the aircraft travelled.
Amazon said it plans to roll out a regular drone air delivery service in the future but that it will be subject to distance and weight restrictions while customers who use it must have a large enough garden for a drone to make a landing.
Currently, the restrictions mean the drone service is only open to two customers. The products they order must also be less than 5.7lbs, with items such as Apple’s Macbook Pro weighing 4.4lbs.
Amazon Air launched on December 7 and delivered a package to a customer in Cambridge in just 13 minutes
Amazon said a new private trial will now deliver packages up to five pounds in weight in 30 minutes or less using the drones
A member of the Amazon team picks up the item at the firm’s Prime Air Fulfillment Centre before it is attached to the drone
A video tweeted by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos showed the journey the package took with the new Amazon Air service
The US tech giant’s billionaire founder Jeff Bezos confirmed the delivery in a tweet earlier today and posted a slick video of the drone’s debut.
He wrote: ‘First-ever AmazonPrimeAir customer delivery is in the books. 13 min – click to delivery.’
In the short clip the drone was launched off a mechanised track from its Prime Air Fulfillment Centre in Cambridge, before soaring to an altitude of 400ft to deliver the package.
However, while the video looks impressive the firm is yet to release details revealing how far the drone’s launch point was from its delivery destination.
In the short clip the drone was launched off a mechanised track from its Prime Air Fulfillment Centre in Cambridge, before soaring to an altitude of 400ft to deliver the package.
However, while the video looks impressive – it leaves questions unanswered.
For example, the firm is yet to make clear how far apart the drone’s launch point was from its delivery destination and whereabouts in Cambridge both locations were.
Although, it is believed the drone was tested in a field near Worsted Lodge, eight miles south of Cambridge. The research and development site for Amazon UK is also in Cambridge.
The drone was launched on a mechanised track at its Prime Air Fullfillment Centre (pictured) before reaching an altitude of 400ft
Amazon plan to roll out the service more widely in the future but said customers would only be able to use drones, pictured, if they had a large enough garden, lived close enough to a depot and ordered goods that weighed less than 5.7lbs
The firm said its drones will use ‘sense and avoid’ technology and data will be continuously gathered throughout the trial to make improvements
Meanwhile the customer did not have to wait long for the delivery and could see the drone arriving via his window, pictured
Amazon said a new private trial will now deliver packages up to five pounds in weight in 30 minutes or less using the drones, which it began testing in the UK earlier this year.
However, the firm has said that the trial will only be available to a small number of customers in the Cambridge area for the time being.
Questions over the safe use of drones remain, however, with a number of near-misses involving commercial aircraft and amateur drone pilots reported this year.
Amazon has proposed using its crafts in ‘segregated blocks of airspace below 500 feet and away from most manned aviation operations’.
The firm also said its drones will use ‘sense and avoid’ technology and data will be continuously gathered throughout the trial to make improvements, calling safety its ‘top priority’.
The company added that the current trial was only permitted to operate during daylight hours with low winds and good visibility, and not in rain, snow or icy conditions.
On its website Amazon said: ‘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 Air is launched amid safety concerns – with a number of near-misses involving commercial aircraft and amateur drone pilots reported this year
Amazon has proposed using its crafts in ‘segregated blocks of airspace below 500 feet and away from most manned aviation operations’
Supposedly the drone is able to alert the Amazon depot when it has fulfilled its delivery and then notifies staff it is returning to base
Meanwhile the customer in Cambridge was happy to find his Amazon Fire TV box and popcorn, pictured, had arrived in one piece.