Isaiah Grose's List: Drones Trend

• A deep 2012 UCLA study of 32 middle-class families in Los Angeles found that 75% of garages were so stuffed—with 300 to 650 boxes—that there was no room to park a car.

  • Researchers have found that many Americans have too much stuff already.  They wonder if drones would fuel this.
• might actually be good for the environment.

  • Drones, benefits
    Drones may be beneficial to the environment. Last mile problem
• using a grocery delivery service can cut carbon dioxide emissions by at least half compared to individual household trips to the store.

  • Delivery services are becoming more efficient and cause less pollution. Drones are a viable option
• which in turn should reduce carbon emissions further still.

  • Delivery solves one problem.  If drones can  be used, it will make delivery even more efficient.
• And since drones are battery-powered drones, as Bezos pointed out in his interview with 60 Minutes’ Charlie Rose, they’ll do more than merely relieving congestion on already crowded roads; they also won’t emit the diesel pollution we associate with delivery trucks

  • Replaces old methods of delivery, which use diesel fuel.  
• found that shoppers are actually less likely to make sudden impulse purchases when they shop online than when they visit a brick-and-mortar store.

  • Surveys show that impulse buys are more common in stores than in online shopping.  the increase of online shopping would reduce wasteful buying.

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• THE future of air power is likely to be unmanned. It may also be surprisingly small.

  • Small drones are becoming more effective than large ones.  
• RQ-11B Raven, made by AeroVironment of Monrovia, California, and widely used by America's armed forces. It looks like a model aircraft. When disassembled it fits into a backpack.

  • The military already has small, well equiped drones.  This technology can be used for delivery drones
• easy to use. The controlling hardware is a tablet computer with buttons on the side, rather like a portable games console, and most people can get the hang of it in a couple of days.

  • Some drones are relatively simple to operate.  This easy use could be translated over to transport drones.
• experimented with turning the drones into miniature bombers, capable of delivering a grenade-sized weapon, to destroy a small vehicle or take out the occupants of a particular room with high precision and little collateral damage.

  • Some fear that delivery drones could be used as weapons.  This is indeed a real concern, as they are already used for this.
• Ravens cost around $56,000 each

  • How much will Amazon's drones cost?

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• Federal regulators have begun considering rules that would allow drones, the pilotless planes being used in the war in Afghanistan, to fly in U.S. airspace.

  • Drones are still not legal in the US, but have been used for some time in other countries.
• such tasks as moving cargo, pinpointing traffic problems, patrolling the border, searching for fugitives or fighting forest fires -- creating a domestic commercial market for drones that some believe could be worth more than $2 billion during this decade."There is a pent-up demand for civil and commercial application" of drones,

  • Drones have been desired in the US for a long time.  They have many useful applications, if given the chance to perform.
• "To even contemplate mixing unmanned vehicles with the commercial sector is widely premature at best," said John Carr, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association. "Yes, there has been some success in Afghanistan but that's a long way from Chicago O'Hare."

  • Many people are skeptic.  they worry about the safety of mixing unmanned vehicles with the commercial sector.
• Flights require FAA approval, which sometimes comes with the caveat that the drones stick to a carefully constructed flight path that keeps them out of regular air traffic and be trailed by a "chase aircraft" -- a piloted plane that ensures that it stays clear of other traffic. The FAA has about 30 certificates outstanding allowing such flights in the past year, although some certificates cover more than one flight.

  • Drone testing in the U.S. has been very limited.  Special certificates are needed, and precautions are followed.  The FAA 

• ss in Afghanistan, industry groups have recently begun talking with the Federal Aviation Administration, hoping to turn greater public awareness into regulatory approval.

  Already, some in Congress are beginning to consider the idea. "I
• "The usefulness of this type of vehicle is infinite. Anything that a small aircraft can do, can be done with a remotely [operated] aircraft," Scott said. "I think one day we will get to that point . . . but the rules and regulations have to be put in place" first.

  • Use this quote
• The Pentagon has been experimenting with pilotless planes for half a century, and for the past 10 years has deployed them in combat missions in areas including the Persian Gulf and the Balkans.

  • History
    Drones have been researched for a lot longer than I thought.
• A fleet of drones could be operated by a relatively small number of operators on the ground, lowering personnel costs, he said. "A comparable-sized crew can operate multiple [drones] instead of operating one manned aircraft," Davidson said. But without pilots aboard, drones can't make the kinds of decisions pilots make every day, critics say. And they say drones were not designed to barrel through U.S. airspace, which can contain more than 8,000 planes at the busiest times.

  • Lowered cost, increased efficiency.  
    Fear: decisions necessary to pilot
• accidents are also a major source of loss," said Steven Zaloga, a weapons expert with Teal Group. Such losses couldn't be sustained in the civilian market, he said.

  • Drones not as reliable as normal aircraft.  
    Note: this article is 10 years old.
• ederal regulations are keeping the drone flights rare and are inhibiting the industry's growth. It typically takes two months to get FAA approval and "chase aircraft" are costly, industry officials complain.

  • FAA approval is needed for testing.  Lack of this is slowing down the industry.

• hey would eventually like to have the same freedom as small aircraft -- to just file a flight plan and take off.

  "An ideal end point would be to be able to file and fly," said Todd Blecher, a Boeing spokesman. "Ultimately we need to get there for there to be a real market opportunity."

  • Certain freedoms are needed for the market to have a chance to use drones in the near future.  Otherwise, testing is too expensive and takes too long to set up.

• Plans call for the Coast Guard to add a drone that lifts vertically from a ship deck by 2006, said John Williams, deputy chief in the Office of Aviation Forces. Another version that would take off from shore and patrol the coastline would arrive in 2016.

  "These vehicles are too costly to be considered throwaways," said Bob Paulison, air systems integration manager for Deepwater, a planned overhaul of the Coast Guard's fleet. "It is certainly part of our acquisition plan to ensure that they are reliable for our operations and safe to fly over populated areas."

  • Coast Guard wants drones. Needs them to be safe to fly over populated areas.

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• The drones were delivered, but aviation authorities kept them on the ground out of concern about mixing drones with manned aircraft in the crowded skies over New Orleans.

  • Even 7 years ago drones were proposed for use in rescue missions, but FAA did not approve.
• "A lot of lives might have been saved had we been able" to use drones, says David Vos, whose Athena Technologies Inc. makes navigation systems for unmanned planes. "In Iraq, drones track the enemy, but we weren't able to track our own people in trees or on roofs to save them."

  • Good quote.
• Drones face regulatory, safety and technological hurdles -- even though demand for them is burgeoning. Government agencies want them for disaster relief, border surveillance and wildfire fighting, while private companies hope to one day use drones for a wide variety of tasks, such as inspecting pipelines and spraying pesticides on farms.

  • Wide possible uses of drones, surveillance is a big part.
• e safety hazards to manned flights, and that regulations need to be put in place to govern their use.

  • Recurring theme, biggest fear is that drones will mess with manned flights.  out of control, no way to stop, blah blah blah.
• Such police programs have been stymied because there weren't FAA guidelines for the rapid deployment of drones in domestic airspace, or the means to get quick approval for flights.

  • The regulations are behind the technology as of now
• two basic safety issues: Drones must be able to see and avoid nearby aircraft, and there must be back-up communications and control systems to cope with emergencies. Drone champions and skeptics agree that these safeguards are necessary before unmanned- plane operators will be able to file a flight plan and take off, just like pilots of conventional planes do today. "We are a long way from there," says Nick Sabatini, the FAA's top safety official. "We recognize the avalanche of demand that is upon us, but we will not compromise safety."

  • Two big safety points.  FAA is stingy about this.
• 100 times that of manned aircraft, and noted that of 135 Predator unmanned surveillance-and-attack planes delivered and used in military operations, 50 have been lost and 34 more have had serious accidents.

  • Again, this is an old article.
    Note: find more recent article with updated accident rates.

• In more than six months of service, the Predator's surveillance aided in the arrest nearly 2,000 illegal immigrants and the seizure of four tons of marijuana, border officials say.

  • Drones Use
    Border patrol, arrest of illegal immigrants, drug seizure.
• Last summer, FAA thwarted several plans to use drones to aid the overstretched rescue teams after Hurricane Katrina. But nearly a year later, amid a new hurricane season, some change is evident. Early this month, the Air Force said that the FAA has cleared the way for Predator drones to be used in disaster relief. The Air Force said there is now a process to authorize specific flights within hours of a request.

  • Look up uses of Drones in disaster relief now.

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• First, the plan got everyone talking about Amazon and its Prime subscription service right at the start of the holiday shopping season

  • Amazon revealing the drones--possibly years before they'll be ready--provided them with other benefits.
• They've become associated with surveillance and militarism, and most rational discussions of the technology are hijacked by fears of the imminent robotic takeover of our skies. While these are justified concerns, I fear they've gotten out of hand.

  • Fears have gotten out of hand, drones are associated with bad things a lot of the time. Amazon's announcement betters their image.
• Long before they'll fly into our backyards with soap, we may see squads of them delivering medicine in developing countries, coordinating emergency relief after disasters, and monitoring crops to improve how we grow food. Are these and other potential applications worth considering, despite the risks of illegal surveillance or even more terrible uses of UAVs? We ought to have that conversation.

  • Delivery will not be the main use of drones.  There are many better uses that also must be considered.
• They're fast, energy efficient, and -- most importantly -- they don't require huge investments in infrastructure to start working.

  • Drones will be especially useful in developing countries. They don't require roads or other investments in infrastructure to start working.
• In this way, drones are similar to cellphones, which blanketed the world with communication without incurring the cost of laying down copper lines.

  • Drones similar to cellphones.  Use this analogy.
• When I load up Amazon.com on my Web browser, data get sent from the company's servers through dozens of intermediary routers and then, finally, to my PC. Matternet envisions blanketing a developing country with drone "landing stations" that would act like those routers.

  • Use this in explanation of drones and how they are designed to work for Amazon.
• With this network approach, the cost of transporting goods could be very low -- about a dollar to carry a four-pound package for about 25 miles, Mr. Raptopoulos says.

  • Super neato pricing info.  use this for sure.  
• Mr. Raptopoulos believes it will take years of work to make UAVs safe, reliable and cheap enough to compete with other transportation vehicles.

  • As opposed to Amazon's optimistic view of things.  When will they really become used commonly?
• But if you live in a big American city, you're more likely to see a self-driving truck drop off your AA batteries than to be visited by a UAV -- at least for much of the next decade.

  • interesting
• agriculture, says Jonathan Downey, CEO of Airware, a startup that is making autopilot systems for commercial UAVs. "There's a huge multibillion-dollar business case for using drones to provide frequent, high-accuracy imaging of crops," says Mr. Downey. Still, his enthusiasm is tempered by the regulatory climate in the U.S. In part because of public fear, the Federal Aviation Administration has imposed strict limits on the use of commercial drones. "We don't expect the U.S. to be more than half of our market," Mr. Downey says.

  • U.S. expected to be less than half of initial market for drones.  One initial use of drones is agriculture.

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• It's starting with medical applications, with plans to extend from there to "bring to the world its next-generation transportation system."

  • Matternet
    Drones with medical purposes.
• "You have the technology that can help the most difficult part of delivery: The last-mile problem. You have a lightweight package going to a single destination. You cannot aggregate packages. It’s still way too complicated and expensive. It’s very energy inefficient," Raptopoulos said. "UAVs or drones deal with the problem of doing this very efficiently with extremely low cost and high reliability. It’s the best answer to the problem. The ratio of your vehicle to your payload weight is very low."

  • LAST MILE PROBLEM
    Drones are ar more efficient than modern day means of transportation.
• In the future, we think it’s going to make more sense to have a bottle of milk delivered to your house from Whole Foods rather than get in your car and drive two tons of metal on a congested road to go get it."

  • Use this quote.
• Amazon

  • p10 
• "We hope the FAA's rules will be in place as early as sometime in 2015," their website contends. "We will be ready at that time."

  • The use of drones is dependent on legislation by FAA.  Amazon believs this will be by 2015.
• "Our assumption is that this may happen in other places in the world first. It may happen in the global south in countries that are developing and don’t have alternatives. There, it's not about cost reduction but giving access when you don’t have access at all."

  • Why in other parts of the world first?  What is wrong with the US's legislation? Why is the FAA so stubborn?
• nd we think it’s going to happen in the first half of next year."

  • Timeline for drone testing.  Matternet is being smart and testing in other countries like Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
• In the near term, Matternet is still trying to get to 100 kilometers by optimizing their system and subsystems. But Raptopoulos is optimistic that it will happen. "There are quadcopters out there that can do 50 kilometers on a single battery charge, but they cost 10x what our target cost is," he said. "How can you get the technology better while keeping the cost down? Technology is pretty good at that. It’s inevitable it’s going to happen."

  • These drones are battery powered.  If they can get to 100 km in one charge, they're in business.  But low cost is key.
• There are three things you're trying to optimize for reliability: time, development, and keeping the cost per vehicle down. The more time and money and cost per vehicle you allow, the better the reliability. For Amazon’s application to make sense, the vehicle cost should be below $20,000. If its $100,000, it’s not cost-effective anymore."

  • Important cost information.  Reliability is key.  They want drones to be considered as reliable as cars.
• He contin

  • p20
• But the question is how quickly, for what level of money, for what reliability. These are the competing factors.

  • Good drones can be built. Good, cheap drones are now the goal

• The FAA may require another level than authorities in Haiti. If you lose a vehicle in Palo Alto, you may be sued for millions of dollars. If you lose a vehicle in Haiti, you may not be sued at all. "

    

  • Testing in other countries where it is legal, and chances of getting sued are lower.
• And each environment brings its own challenges.  

  "You have to worry about specific problems in specific environments. In Haiti, you have to worry about dust. If you want to work in San Francisco, you have to have worry about GPS signals being lost because of the terrain."

  • j

• Assuming you can work out the technology, why won't people just shoot them out of the sky?

    

  "They fly at 400 feet between 45-65 kilometers an hour and they are very small. At that height, you can barely see them. You cannot hear them. It’s like a

  • This solves the worry of shooting down drones.  Use this in descriptions of drones and stuff.
• As you

  • p30

• "It would be people on the ground who understand how their location works. Those people are the experts on the ground. They know how to read the country and protect their assets."

    

  What do you think

  • Drones are vulnerable when they land.  Therefore, all landing sites will have to be protected somewhat or at least watched by experts on the ground.
• "We’ve just had a public statement from a big company they want it to happen. Public acceptance goes hand in hand with regulation. 

  • Public acceptance and regulation go hand in hand"" use this quote.

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• Meanwhile, Landcare Research is also working with Tuberculosis (TB) Free NZ on designing a drone that uses infra-red technology to target possum populations.

  • Drones used as pest control.  Use this as another useful appication of drones in our society.  Infrared light

• Although it is expensive to implement, the technology is likely to become cheaper over time.

  "The way I look at it is to draw parallels with new PlayStations and XBox - if you went out now and bought it it'd be very expensive ... but in a couple of years' time they'll be half that price."

  Conservation spin-off for DoCDoC spokesman Herb Christophers says the research initiatives could help expand a "very small toolbox" of pest control methods at DoC's disposal.

  • As the technology becomes more common and more widely used, its price is likely to go down.  Time

• One reason customers will not receive UAV delivery service any sooner than 2015 is because that is how long Congress gave the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to safely integrate UAVs into U.S. airspace. It is a tall order, considering the FAA estimates that 15,000 UAVs will fly across U.S. airspace by 2020—and 30,000 by 2030.

  • Drones
• . Although legislators, the FAA, and the public are not Amazon’s enemy, each group could surely put a wrench in Amazon’s plan.

  • DRones legislation
• Amazon will need to develop ways to protect its trade secrets as well because it is likely to face fierce competition if its delivery model is successful.

  • Amazon competition

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• “It’s a great tool to collect information to make better decisions, and we’re just scratching the surface of what it can do for farmers,” said Blair, who lives in Kendrick, Idaho, roughly 275 miles north of Boise.

  • Drones being used in agriculture.  How that might help, benefits
• Drones, also known as UAVs, are already used overseas in agriculture, including Japan and Brazil.

  • Use in countries outside the U.S. We are falling behind in terms of drone use, we need to take advantage of the technology.
• About a dozen sheriff’s offices, police and fire departments, as well as U.S. Customs and Border Protection, have been allowed to use drones.

  • Drone use very limited, even by the government.

• “A small UAV flying over a field with nothing around it doesn’t create a privacy issue,” he said. “We’re talking about an operating atmosphere that’s much more benign.”

  Last year, Congress directed the FAA to grant unmanned aircraft access to U.S. skies by September 2015. The agency is in the midst of developing operational guidelines for drone use, but it said the process would take longer than Congress expected.

  • Congress directed FAA to grant drones access to U.S. skies.
• “We’re talking surgical agriculture, which allows us to be more environmentally friendly,” he said, “because we can be even more precise in how we apply fertilizer, water or pesticides.”

  • Drones will allow farmers to be more precise, more environmentally friendly as well.

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• February 4, 2002, that the CIA first used an unmanned Predator drone in a targeted killing. The strike was in Paktia province in Afghanistan, near the city of Khost. The intended target was Osama bin Laden, or at least someone in the CIA had thought so. Donald Rumsfeld later explained, using the passive voice of government: “A decision was made to fire the Hellfire missile. It was fired.”

  • First Drone attack ever.
• The CIA had been flying unarmed drones over Afghanistan since 2000. It began to fly armed drones after the September 11 attacks

  • The September 11 attacks began the use of armed drones in Afghanistan.
• After the February 2002 strike, military officials quickly acknowledged that the “tall man” was not bin Laden. But they insisted the targets were “legitimate,” although they struggled to explain why, using vague and even coy language to cover up what appeared to be uncertainty. Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clark said, “We’re convinced that it was an appropriate target.” But she added, “We do not know yet exactly who it was.” Gen. Tommy Franks told ABC News that he expected the identities of the three to prove “interesting.”

  • They were unaware who was struck in the strike, but quickly realized they were mistaken in their assumption.  

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• In 1916, a military scientist conceived of an "aerial torpedo" designed to be loaded with explosives and steered into the deadly Zeppelins on their bombing raids over southern England. In a lecture to the Royal Aeronautical Society on Monday evening Michael Draper, author of Sitting Ducks & Peeping Toms, will lift the wraps off the secret century of unmanned air vehicles, starting with the prototype referred to by the innocuous initials "AT".

   

  The fledgling air ministry's Professor Archibald Low, an

  • First drones designed. 

• Drones are used in situations where manned flight is considered too risky or difficult. They provide troops with a 24-hour "eye in the sky", seven days a week. Each aircraft can stay aloft for up to 17 hours at a time,

  • Military Drone use.
• small intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance craft, some light enough to be launched by hand, to medium-sized armed drones and large spy planes.

  • Surveillance is also a large portion of what drones are used for.

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• A Pentagon official said at the time that the team monitoring the images relayed back by the drone, one of the C.I.A.'s latest high-technology weapons, spotted a tall man and thought he might be a top leader of Al Qaeda.

  • They thought it was bin Laden