Commercial Drones: UPS

Brief Intro

What are Drones?

A drone is an aircraft without a human pilot aboard, otherwise known as a UAV, Unmaned Ariel Vehicle. UAV include a ground-based controller, and a system of communications between the two. The flight of droines are also able to operate with different degrees of autonomy/ This ranges from remote control by a human operator, or fully or intermittently autonomously, by on-board computers.

Drones can be differentiated by a level of automation that renders its flight dependent upon pre-programmed behaviors, as opposed to a UAV which is a remotely piloted aircraft flown by “stick and rudder” with a pilot in control. However these classifications are debatable and thus maked the term synonymous to each other. We will be focusing more on commercial drones such as Quad Copter drones.

Military

                                                           MQ-9 Reaper

Drones were first introduced by the military and the idea for drones came a long time before mechanical airplanes. Drones have always been a preferred method of combat for missions too "dangerous" for humans. They originated mostly in military applications, although their use is expanding in commercial, scientific, recreational, agricultural, and other applications such as policing and surveillance, product deliveries, aerial photography, agriculture and drone racing. Civilian drones now vastly outnumber military drones, with estimates of over a million sold by 2015.

Commercial Use

A DJI Phantom UAV for commercial and recreational aerial photography

Drones are currently very abundant in many different types of commercial uses that range from aerial crop surveys, aerial photography, search and rescue, inspection of power lines and pipelines, counting wildlife, delivering medical supplies to otherwise inaccessible regions, and detection of illegal hunting, reconnaissance operations, cooperative environment monitoring, border patrol missions, convoy protection, forest fire detection and monitoring, surveillance, coordinating humanitarian aid, plume tracking, land surveying, fire and large-accident investigation, landslide measurement, illegal landfill detection, the construction industry and crowd monitoring.

Currently, hobbyists have registered over 181,000 drones since the Federal Aviation Administration opened a new registration system back in 2015. This does not completely reflect all drones since it does not include in registered drones and home made drones. Also the FAA has granted over 3,000 permits to businesses, up from 1,000 through early 2015.

Companies that are currently planning to use drones include:

• Amazon Prime Air 
• HL 
• BT 
• Shell 
• BBC British Media 
• UPS 
• 7-Eleven 

.... and many more

Companies Using Drones

UPS

Since September 2016, UPS has been testing drones to make commecrical delivery to remote locations. UPS has partnered with CyPhy Works a Drone-maker and planson using drones as delivery drives wing-men to make deliveries even faster. The delivery giant has been seen in Florida testing and offering a reminder of UPS' interest in using new technologies to improve deliveries. UPS is using new electric delivery truck with a drone launchpad. Inside, a driver loads a package into the drone's cargo bin. Then a section of the truck's roof opens, so that the drone can take off.

After the drone lifts off, the human drives away to deliver a separate package. Then the drone and truck rendezvous at another location, where the drone is loaded with a fresh package. If implemented, that cycle could continue for a driver's entire shift, allowing UPS to deliver packages more efficiently and save on fuel.

Having a dock design implemented for this drone delivery system solves many challenges associated with drones. This would help as a power station, monitoring, and security of drones.

Drone tech, however, is still far from perfection. There are also many regulatory hold-ups. It's not legal to run a fully automated drone delivery service in the United States. UPS currently has one of its executives on the FAA's drone advisory council, an indication of its interest in drones.

Video : UPS Drone Test


Resources
DroneNews
Drone Racing
Official Regulations
Regulation Information
Build Your Own Drone

Technical Aspects

Typical flight-control loops for a multirotor

Degree of Autonomy

References
BBC
DroneZon
TechWorld
SupplyChainDigital
TechCrunch
CNN Tech
Fortune Drone Registration