Delivery Drones

I was watching 60 Minutes on Sunday and saw the piece on Amazon.  I laughed when they unveiled their latest technological advancement, the delivery drone.  Why did I laugh, you may ask?  Amazon alone says that 86% of their daily deliveries weigh five pounds or less and could be accommodated by a delivery drone or octocopter.  In case you didn't know it, Amazon ships about 26 million packages per day.  If you were to take 10% of that amount being in the form of actual products that could be 2.5 million flights per day.  What about other retailers, express delivery companies and even the post office?  Can you imagine the skies being filled with tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of drones making deliveries every day?  On my street alone with all of the internet shopping that occurs, especially at Christmas from our house, the neighbors would think that they were under attack from the so called octocopters.  

Is the technology creative; sure it is, but logistically it would certainly have a monumental number of challenges.  But wait a minute, to give you comfort, Jeff Bezos, the visionary CEO of Amazon, will have to go to Washington, DC to make his case before Congress, the FAA and Homeland Security, just to name a few.  He says that these approvals and the fully vetted technology are years away from "taking off.”  I sure hope that Jeff Bezos is prepared for his dream to wait a couple of DOZEN years.