By: Nick Gambino
Amazon revolutionized online shopping with a huge inventory and lightning fast deliveries. A couple years ago, they decided to take it to the next level by introducing drones into their network. Just this week, they launched same-day drone delivery in Arizona as part of their Prime Air program.
Now, drones are not going to fully replace human delivery drivers any time soon. But what it does do is speed up delivery of small items. Amazon says that drones can deliver items up to 5 pounds in less than an hour.
Upon launch, there are 50,000 items eligible for drone delivery. Customers in the West Valley section of the Phoenix Metro Area can order things across a wide variety of categories, including beauty items, household products and office supplies. These will fly directly from a location right next to the local Tolleson Same-Day facility.
Amazon is using the MK30 drone, developed specifically by their in-house engineering team for these types of deliveries. This is the same drone they’re using in College Station, Texas. Prime Air engineers worked on design features that allow drones to more safely navigate highly populated suburban areas and even fly when it’s raining.
Another important thing they worked on in the design phase was how to make them as quiet as possible. According to Amazon the MK30 drone is 50% quieter than any previous drone. This was vital to acceptance by the community. If you had hundreds or thousands of drones flying through the sky, compounding noise pollution, that would be a problem.
“We’ve flown the new MK30 drone and put it through its paces at our indoor and outdoor test facilities,” reads an Amazon blog post announcing the new service. “We’re using the data from this process to demonstrate to regulators around the world the reliability of our system.”
While same-day drone delivery is being piloted in both Texas and Arizona, Amazon shut down the program in California earlier this year. This newest development in Phoenix suggests they plan on making this a permanent part of the same-day delivery system.
