Drone delivery

   It’s been nearly a year since Jeff Bezos, chief executive officer of Amazon, went on CBS‘s “60 Minutes” to launch the perception of drones as delivery tools into the national consciousness. Of course, commercially operated unmanned aircraft systems had been in the logistics lexicon long before Bezos’ somewhat audacious announcement of an Amazon Prime Air drone delivery program by 2015, but his appearance on “60 Minutes” pushed the question — is it feasible? 
   Well, the jury is still out on Amazon; though many in the industry saw the announcement as a cheap publicity stunt, company officials have been gathering together a top-flight team for the Prime Air program. The largest hurdle that remains is approval from the Federal Aviation Administration, which was told by Congress in 2012 to get working on a plan to integrate drones into the national airspace by September 2015. In July, the Department of Transportation looked into the FAA’s progress and saw it was still a long way off from this goal.   
   After low-to-no activity on the approval front from the FAA, the agency has finally made a few steps toward that goal by green-lighting commercial drones for limited use in Hollywood. Yes, unmanned aerial vehicles delivering packages is still a long way off domestically, but the FAA has told six companies they can now legally use drones for sweeping landscape shots and extreme close-ups — or whatever they have planned.  
   In a statement, Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx called the approval, which came down in late September, “a significant milestone in broadening commercial UAS use while ensuring we maintain our world-class safety record in all forms of flight.” The agency heard the pleas of seven production companies, and decided to let them work around general-flight regulations currently on the books; mandates regarding equipment and maintenance; and pilot-certificate requirements. The actual operators of the drones have to keep them in their sightline at all times and maintain flights within a specific area of the set; drone flights can’t occur at night, and they must be inspected before every flight. 
   “These companies are blazing a trail that others are already following, offering the promise of new advances in agriculture and utility safety and maintenance,” Foxx said. 
   Former Sen. Chris Dodd, who is now chairman and CEO of the Motion Picture Association of America, saw the decision as a victory for Hollywood.
   “It gives filmmakers yet another way to push creative boundaries and create the kinds of scenes and shots we could only imagine just a few years ago. Our industry has a history of successfully using this innovative technology overseas — making movies like  ‘Skyfall’ and ‘Transformers: Age of Extinction,’ to name a couple—and we are proud to now be on the leading edge of its safe commercial use here at home,” he stated, noting the ruling will encourage more domestic-made movies. 
   Vortex Aerial, one of the companies involved in the quest for FAA approval, recently released a statement addressing the importance of the FAA’s decision. 
   “We are very proud to be a part of this monumentally historical event,” the company said. “Being the result of over four years of industry-leader collaboration, we can only hope that this most daunting and financially taxing of tasks will finally come to fruition and not be yet another false start for our industry. Our steadfast and diligent efforts will hopefully open for all, the long-awaited implementation of this bristling new technology.”
   For an idea of what’s at stake, Michael Toscano, CEO of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, recently said commercial drone approval will help usher in 100,000 jobs in the first decade. The $82 billion he predicted will be generated is nothing to sneeze at, either. 
   So approval can’t come soon enough. The FAA is diligently working — it has all six of its university drone test sites up and running — but it seems like Europe has pulled ahead in the game. DHL announced recently the start of a drone medicine-delivery project between Germany and the North Sea island of Juist. Officials said drones would fly cargo whenever alternatives like flights or transport by ferry are impossible. Even though it’s not a full-time project, this still marks a bit of history. According to DHL, the project is the first time someone has piloted a drone in Europe “outside the pilot’s field of vision in a real-life mission.” Though the drone flight is autonomous, pilots will be standing by to take the controls if any hiccups occur.
   The German Ministry of Transport played a major part in the getting approvals for the project, which has been in the works since December, and creating a special drone flight space for the 12-kilometer voyage. Microdrones GmbH and RWTH Aachen University’s Institute of Flight Systems Dynamics also helped. 
   “Our DHL parcelcopter 2.0 is already one of the safest and most reliable flight systems in its class that meets the requirements needed to fulfill such a mission,” DHL’s Jürgen Gerdes, CEO of eCommerce, parcel division, said in a statement. “We are proud that this additional service can create added value for the residents of and visitors to the island of Juist and are pleased with the support we have received from the involved communities and agencies.”
   Domestic integrators have looked at drone delivery programs before, but have chosen to take a largely wait-and-see approach. Google is following Amazon’s lead and jumping into the technology behind drone delivery, but both companies will be hamstrung if the FAA doesn’t act more quickly to carve out a regulatory framework for the technology’s use.

This column was published in the November 2014 issue of American Shipper.