Amazon, long in the process of trying to persuade the FAA to remove its line-of-sight requirements to allow delivery by drone, announced a new plan this week it claims would solve many of the FAA’s reservations. The delivery company wants to create a “drone zone” between 200 and 400 feet altitude. The area would leave room below for amateur drones and other model aircraft and room above for manned aircraft — leaving the middle for high-speed, unmanned delivery drones, some of which the company argues should be exempt from line-of-sight requirements.
Under Amazon’s plan, four classes of drones would be created, with the fourth being allowed to carry out beyond line of sight flight in that designated zone, day or night, regardless of the weather. This plan flies in the face of the current proposed FAA regulations, which require drones to be flown only during daylight hours, in good weather conditions and within the pilot’s line-of-sight. To make this possible, the drone would have to be outfitted with a good deal of advanced technology, including anti-collision hardware and software, high-speed Internet connections, geospatial data of all potential flight paths, monitoring technology that could communicate with satellites and air traffic control, and the ability to avoid moving targets, like other drones and birds. Not all of this technology even exists at this point, and our air traffic control infrastructure is not equipped to handle the extra communications that would be necessary to facilitate it. But Amazon suggests that the drone industry should come together to focus on new standards that would pave the way toward these sorts of advances.
This push from Amazon is hardly new, with the company first announcing its idea of automated delivery by drones back in 2013. Yet the FAA has proved reticent to open up to the idea, declining to authorize drones for commercial operations and specifically excluding delivering packages as an allowable use of drones. Amazon applied for an experimental flying license, which was granted, but only once the FAA released its draft rules, which would make Amazon’s plans impossible. The results of this back and forth will define the future of unmanned aviation , and determine what we will see when we look to the sky.
