Google on
Thursday lifted the veil on an experimental program to deliver goods with tiny
unmanned, or “drone,” aircraft that are a cross between a plane and a
helicopter, according to Google. The project was detailed in alengthy Atlantic
story.
Program,
which Google is calling Project Wing, was led for two years by Nicholas Roy, an M.I.T. professor who
took a sabbatical for the project. According to The Atlantic, Google now has
dozens of people on Project Wing. They’re working on improving the technology,
and may create a drone delivery application.
The Federal
Aviation Administration has so far not been keen on the drone delivery concept.
Earlier this year, it blocked an aerial delivery service proposed by a local
brewery in Minnesota for ferrying beer to ice fishermen who didn’t want to come
in from the cold.
A Google
spokeswoman said the company has briefed the F.A.A. on its hopes for a fleet of
baby helicopters, which would not be built for at least a few years.
The actual
delivery would be handled, Google said it tried the parachute approach as well
as shooting the package downward like a missile. They also tried landing it,
but that was problematic because Google believed people might get too close to
the vehicle and lose a finger to the drone’s rotors while trying to fetch their
delivery.
In the end,
they settled on a kind of fishing line that lowers the payload to customers
from an airborne drone about 150 feet above the ground, as Google demonstrates
with a package of dog food.
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