Drone Delivery Services Are a Step Closer to Happening

Amazon announced its ambitious plans for drone-to-home delivery back in December 2013, imagining a future where robots could deliver our packages. However, the Prime Air delivery drones promo video unveiling the idea had to be filmed abroad due to restricting FAA regulations. A year later, Amazon threatened to take the program abroad if the FAA didn’t begin allowing outdoor drone testing. Well, the FAA has finally issued Amazon a special “experimental airworthiness certificate” to conduct outdoor research, testing and training of its Prime Air delivery drones. This news follows the FAA’s move last month that proposed new rules to help legalize commercial drone flights, and the FAA has been giving certain companies the green light for testing. However, the exemption granted enforces that the drone must be in the line of view of the pilot at all times, which makes sense for initial testing but would severely hamper any large-scale rollout in the future.