Thursday, 25 September 2014

EUROPE
A quadcopter drone with a small delivery flies at the Deutsche Post/DHL headquarters in Bonn, Germany.
Photographer: AFP via Getty Images
A quadcopter drone with a small delivery flies at the Deutsche Post/DHL headquarters in Bonn, Germany.

DHL Beats Amazon, Google to First Planned Drone Delivery

By Richard Weiss
September 25, 2014 1:50 AM EDT
Germany’s Wadden Sea, World Heritage-designated wetlands recognized for their importance in the conservation of migratory birds, will soon host frequent fliers of a different kind when drones enter the skies typically populated by spoonbills, cormorants and geese.
Deutsche Post AG, Europe’s largest postal service, is about to begin deliveries of medication and other urgent goods to the island of Juist using unmanned helicopters after securing approval from state and federal transport ministries and air traffic control authorities to operate in a restricted flight area. The vehicles, called parcelcopters, will operate from tomorrow, weather permitting, and fly for four to six weeks in the pilot project, the Bonn-based company said yesterday.
“With the parcelcopter, an unmanned aircraft operating outside the controller’s field of vision will perform deliveries for the first time in a real-world mission,” Juergen Gerdes, Deutsche Post’s board member responsible for mail, parcel and electronic commerce activities, said in a statement.
Domesticating Drones
The trial-run may help Deutsche Post stake a claim to a part of the logistics chain in which postal operators and express service providers are increasingly being challenged by Internet retailers. U.S. online retailer Amazon.com Inc.and search giant Google Inc. have begun testing drones for deliveries, while the Federal Aviation Administration last year said it won’t permit autonomous flights without pilots in the U.S. until it crafts rules for them.

Unmanned Aircraft

The German company will fly the drones along the 12-kilometer (7.5 miles) stretch from the passenger port of Norddeich to a designated launch pad on Juist, from where a local courier service will transport the goods to the recipient. The service will improve availability of medication on the island, which is a car-free zone that’s only reachable by aircraft and ferry.
Powered by four identical fixed-pitch propellers, the drone can carry loads of up to 1.2 kilograms (2.6 pounds) in specially designed containers. While it’s designed to be rain, snow, and dust-proof, operations will only commence when weather permits, Deutsche Post said. The drone can fly for 45 minutes, and will be monitored from a ground station.
Google’s researchers have been exploring the use of unmanned aircraft for about two years, testing the delivery of radios, dog treats and cattle vaccines to farms in Queensland, Australia. Amazon has only tested drones within the confines of its laboratories or outside the U.S., and has requested permission in its home country to expand outside its research labs.
Movie makers, real-estate agents, criminal-defense lawyers and farmers are also among groups lobbying to make drones legal. The FAA expects to propose rules for commercial drones weighing less than 55 pounds later this year and has so far only approved such flights in the Arctic regions of Alaska.
To contact the reporter on this story: Richard Weiss in Frankfurt atrweiss5@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Benedikt Kammel atbkammel@bloomberg.net Angela Cullen
More News: Europe, Germany, Retail
11 COMMENTS
barmasters5 hours ago
Just wonder what's going to happen when some little kid sees a drone about to land and tried to touch it and loses a hand or is otherwise seriously injured. Sometimes they don't think everything through. Related:http://nypost.com/2013/09/05/man-decapit...
AustrianSchool6 hours ago
There are lots of reasons not to do this at this early date, but saving someone's crappy job deliverying packages isn't one of them.
GinPalmer7 hours ago
Thieves must see this as a great opportunity.I wonder how many packages will ever make it to their destination.
Smart Guy9 hours ago
Big companies using technology to kill jobs and increase profits so they can buy back their own stock to reward executives. Very sad. The beat goes on...
FreedomTrickle13 hours ago
let the drone season begin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaF9rE-uE...
1 Replies
wilmers1313 hours ago
On these northern German islands there may be a justification but generally this is a very foolish development. How many more unemployed will there be when so many parcel deliverers are sacked? Secondly, the little white van that delivers parcels here is ONE vehicle, coming here with maybe 100 parcels on his run, and then he leaves. Delivery by drones could create buzzing of 100 flights in this neighbourhood - this would be unacceptable. Not everything that can be done should be done.
2 Replies
Jack Bluebird13 hours ago
I wonder at which altitude it will fly and how much noise they generate. If it flies low enough consider them moving targets for shooting practice.
Alfred J. Ortiz13 hours ago
What about drones for criminals? Abuses are inevitable and I wonder what other problems - or solutions - might be realized; maybe a Magnicopter to pull in unlicensed drones, tunnel footpaths, and don't forget DroneFree helmets, which, in fact, will become mandatory to protect us. Certainly a bird's rights group could save us all!
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