The next time you order a takeaway, it might be flown directly to your door. Today, Deliveroo has launched its first drone delivery service for customers in Ireland. Drones travelling at speeds of up to 50 miles per hour (80 kph) will carry food from restaurants to customers in as little as three minutes. Upon arrival, the drone will hover above the customer's home and gently lower the food to the ground on a tether before returning to the delivery hub. Launching in Blanchardstown, on the outskirts of Dublin, the trial will cover a 1.8-mile (3km) radius, reaching up to 150,000 people.

Three days before Christmas 2022, Amazon Prime Air was set to deliver its first commercial package by drone to a residential customer in Lockeford, California. It was supposed to be a celebration, a culmination of tens of thousands of test flights, years of dealing with Federal Aviation Administration paperwork, a decade of development, and $2 billion of investment. Early that morning, about 40 people--including FAA officials, Amazon engineers, public relations staff, and Prime Air chief pilot Jim Mullin--waited outside a steel frame warehouse on a flat, 20-acre parcel of land flanked by vineyards. Inside the warehouse, a flight crew had loaded the drone--a six-propeller, roughly 80-pound carbon-fiber MK27-2--with a lithium-ion battery and a box containing an Exploding Kittens card game. But when the operator in charge tried to load the flight package, the software wouldn't boot up, says a former employee who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation: "That's when panic started to set in, and the higher-ups went into war-room mode."

After years of growth bulletins, Amazon will likely be rolling out supply by drone for Prime prospects in areas of California and Texas. Whereas that is a small slice of consumers, for now, this information could not be extra necessary for the business drone sector, which has been gathering tons of momentum over the previous couple of months. Amazon will be a part of Walmart in providing restricted drone supply to a subset of consumers, signaling a vote of confidence within the expertise and a shifting regulatory surroundings from the 2 behemoth retailers. Amazon's Prime Air service will ship packages as much as 5 kilos in lower than an hour utilizing drones. The service is about to roll out to prospects in Lockeford, California, and School Station, Texas.

An Amazon drone sparked an acres-wide fire last summer when it crashed in eastern Oregon during a test flight, according to a Federal Aviation Administration report. The drone's motors failed during the flight in June, the report said, causing it to plummet 160 feet to the ground. A video referenced in the report shows the drone "tumbling in uncontrolled free fall until it contacted the ground," the report said. An "intense lithium battery fire quickly consumed the aircraft," and the fire soon spread to the field where the drone had crash-landed, the report added. "Several acres of wheat stubble field were soon on fire," it said.

Getting an Amazon package delivered from the sky is closer to becoming a reality. The Federal Aviation Administration said Monday it had granted Amazon approval to deliver packages by drones. Amazon said that the approval is an "important step," but added that it is still testing and flying the drones. It did not say when it expected drones to make deliveries to shoppers. "This certification is an important step forward for Prime Air and indicates the FAA's confidence in Amazon's operating and safety procedures for an autonomous drone delivery service that will one day deliver packages to our customers around the world," said David Carbon, vice president of Prime Air.

Amazon customers in the U.S. could soon have their deliveries completed by an unmanned drone. The Federal Aviation Administration has approved Amazon's Prime Air service, which will use drones to deliver packages. The FAA issued a "Part 135 air carrier certificate using unmanned aircraft systems" to Amazon on Saturday, the agency confirmed in a statement to USA TODAY. Similar certificates have been issued to Wing Aviation, a subsidiary of Google parent company Alphabet, and UPS Flight Forward. In a statement, David Carbon, vice president of Prime Air said the company will continue working on their technology to integrate delivery drones into the airspace.

Amazon has been testing drones for delivering some small packages. Amazon Prime Air has cleared a regulatory hurdle, moving the online retail giant one step closer to dropping packages off at your doorstep with drones. The US Federal Aviation Administration on Saturday issued Amazon Prime Air a "Part 135 air carrier certificate," allowing it to begin commercial drone deliveries in the US. "Amazon Prime Air's concept uses autonomous UAS (unmanned aircraft systems) to safely and efficiently deliver packages to customers," said a spokesperson for the FAA on Monday. "The FAA supports innovation that is beneficial to the public, especially during a health or weather-related crisis."

As of today, Amazon is officially an "air carrier." The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) granted Amazon Prime Air the designation, which allows Amazon to begin its first commercial delivery trials in the US, Bloomberg reports. The company will use the hexagon-shaped next-gen hybrid drone it showed off last year. Amazon has not revealed when or where it will begin its commercial delivery trials, but as Bloomberg points out, it does have test sites in the Northwest and in the nearby Vancouver area. Amazon has also tested drones in the UK.

Amazon is continuing to'secretly' test the capability of its Air Prime delivery drones at their proving ground in the UK countryside. Engineers in high vis jackets were spotted yesterday flying drones on wires from a giant metal gantry in a field near Cambridge, England. It is unclear why the drones are being flown attached to cables -- but could perhaps help to determine the drone's positions relative to the crane as they land. Cameras and sensors have also been added to the metal frame to carry out tests on the drones and check they can navigate and land correctly. The company first began secretly flying its drones in a field near Cambridge three years ago, in July 2016, after the UK's Civil Aviation Authority lifted the previous strict drone flying restrictions.

Gur Kimchi, vice president of Prime Air, talks about Amazon's drone delivery service. Federal officials recently approved a patent for the company to explore allowing its drones to provide "home surveillance" for its customers. Gur Kimchi, vice president of Prime Air, talks about Amazon's drone delivery service. Federal officials recently approved a patent for the company to explore allowing its drones to provide "home surveillance" for its customers. Going on vacation and want some extra security around your home?