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 The Amazon CEO is working on a way to use the small aircraft to
get parcels to customers in 30 minutes or less. While flight
technology makes it feasible, U.S. law and society's attitude toward
drones haven't caught up with Bezos' vision.
Amazon.com Inc. says it's working on the so-called Prime Air
unmanned aircraft project but it will take years to advance the
technology and for the Federal Aviation Administration to create the
necessary rules and regulations.
The project was first reported by CBS' "60 Minutes" Sunday night,
hours before millions of shoppers turned to their computers to hunt
Cyber Monday bargains.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said in the interview that while his
octocopters look like something out of science fiction, there's no
reason they can't be used as delivery vehicles.
Bezos said the drones can carry packages that weigh up to five
pounds, which covers about 86 percent of the items Amazon delivers.
The drones the company is testing have a range of about 10 miles,
which Bezos noted could cover a significant portion of the
population in urban areas.
Bezos told "60 Minutes" the project could become a working service
in four or five years.
Unlike the drones used by the military, Bezos' proposed flying
machines won't need humans to control them remotely. Amazon's drones
would receive a set of GPS coordinates and automatically fly to
them, presumably avoiding buildings, power lines and other
obstacles.
Delivery drones raise a host of concerns, from air traffic safety to
homeland security and privacy. There are technological and legal
obstacles, too —similar to Google's experimental driverless car. How
do you design a machine that safely navigates the roads or skies
without hitting anything? And, if an accident occurs, who's legally
liable?
Delivering packages by drone might be impossible in a city like
Washington D.C. which has many no-fly zones.
But technology entrepreneur and futurist Ray Kurzweil notes that
"technology has always been a double edged sword."
"Fire kept us warm and cooked our food but also was used to burn
down our villages," says Kurzweil.
"It's fascinating as an idea and probably very hard to execute,"
says Tim Bajarin, an analyst with Creative Strategies who sees Bezos
as an unconventional thinker. "If he could really deliver something
you order within 30 minutes, he would rewrite the rules of online
retail."
Amazon has already done that once. In 1995, with investments from
family and friends, Bezos began operating Amazon as an online
bookseller out of a Seattle garage. Over nearly two decades, Amazon
grew to become the world's largest online retailer, selling
everything from shoes to groceries to diapers and power tools.
Amazon spends heavily on growing its business, improving order
fulfillment and expanding into new areas. Those investments have
come at the expense of consistent profitability, but investors have
been largely forgiving, focusing on the company's long-term promise
and double-digit revenue growth.
The company spent almost $2.9 billion in shipping last year,
accounting for 4.7 percent of its net sales.
There is no prohibition on flying drones for recreational use, but
since 2007, the Federal Aviation Administration has said they can't
be used for commercial purposes.
"The technology has moved forward faster than the law has kept
pace," says Brendan Schulman, special counsel at the law firm Kramer
Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP.
Schulman is currently challenging that regulation before a federal
administrative law judge on behalf of a client who was using a
radio-controlled aircraft to shoot video for an advertising agency.
Autonomous flights like Amazon is proposing, without somebody at the
controls, are also prohibited.
The FAA is slowly moving forward with guidelines on commercial drone
use. Last year, Congress directed the agency to grant drones access
to U.S. skies by September 2015. But the agency already has missed
several key deadlines and said the process would take longer than
Congress expected.
The FAA plans to propose rules next year that could allow limited
use of drones weighing up to 55 pounds. But those rules are expected
to include major restrictions on where drones can fly, posing
significant limits on what Amazon could do. Many of the commercial
advances in drone use have come out of Europe, Australia, and Japan.
In Australia, for instance, an electric company is using drones to
check on remote power lines.
"The delay has really been to the disadvantage of companies here,"
Schulman says. "Generally, the government wants to promote the
advancement of science and technology. In this case, the government
has done exactly the opposite and thwarted the ability of small,
startup companies to develop commercial applications for this
revolutionary technology."
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Amazon isn't the only company awaiting guidelines. A Domino's
franchise in the United Kingdom released a test flight video in June
of the "DomiCopter," a drone used to deliver hot pizza.
"We think it's cool that places like Amazon are exploring the
concept," says Domino's spokesman Chris Brandon. "We'd be surprised
if the FAA ever let this fly in the States — but we will surely stay
tuned to see where this all goes."
Matt Waite, a journalism professor at the University of Nebraska and
head of the university's Drone Journalism Lab, says a bigger problem
for Amazon is that the rules are not expected to allow autonomous
drones, so a remote pilot would have to be in command of the
aircraft at all times.
Indeed, the FAA said Monday that it is moving forward with
"regulations and standards for the safe integration of remote
piloted (drones) to meet increased demand." The agency reiterated
that "autonomous (drone) operation is not currently allowed in the
United States."
Given the slow pace at which the FAA typically approves regulations,
Waite calls Bezos' prediction of four or five years for approval
unrealistic.
Safety concerns could be the real obstacle in delaying drones for
widespread commercial use.
"You're putting a device with eight rapidly spinning blades into
areas where people are assumed to be," Waite says. "The threat to
people on the ground is significant."
It's not hard to imagine that the world's biggest online retailer
has some significant lobbying muscle and might be able to persuade
the FAA to alter the rules.
Amazon spokeswoman Mary Osako says the company has been in contact
with the FAA "as they are actively working on necessary regulation."
One of the biggest promises for civilian drone use is in agriculture
because of the industry's largely unpopulated, wide open spaces.
Delivering Amazon packages in midtown Manhattan will be much
trickier. But the savings of such a delivery system only come in
large, urban areas.
Besides regulatory approval, Amazon's biggest challenge will be to
develop a collision avoidance system, says Darryl Jenkins, a
consultant who gave up on the commercial airline industry and now
focuses on drones.
Who is to blame, Jenkins asked, if the drone hits a bird, crashes
into a building? Who is going to insure the deliveries?
There are also technical questions. Who will recharge the drone
batteries? How many deliveries can the machines make before needing
service?
"Jeff Bezos might be the single person in the universe who could
make something like this happen," Jenkins says. "For what it worth,
this is a guy who's totally changed retailing."
If Amazon gets its way, others might follow.
United Parcel Service Co. executives heard a presentation from a
drone vendor earlier this year, says Alan Gershenhorn, UPS' chief
sales, marketing and strategy officer.
"Commercial use of drones is an interesting technology, and we're
certainly going to continue to evaluate it," Gershenhorn says.
The U.S. Postal Service and FedEx wouldn't speculate about using
drones for delivery.
[Associated
Press; SCOTT MAYEROWITZ, AP Business Writer]
With reports from
Barbara Ortutay in New York, David Koenig in Dallas and Sam Hananel
in Washington, D.C.
Scott Mayerowitz can be
reached at
http://twitter.com/GlobeTrotScott.
Copyright 2013 The Associated
Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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