- Cruises at 80-120m and 60mph
- Max payload of 1.8kg
- 50 mile max delivery distance (although it can fly 190 mile on a single charge)
- Payload dropped by parachute from 25-30m into a 5m diameter landing zone.
More details on Wikipedia[1] and the Zipline site[2]
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zipline_(drone_delivery_comp...
From their website:
> Lowering from the body of the Platform 2 Zip, this little droid uses onboard perception to leave packages exactly where they're supposed to go, whether that's a doorstep or patio table.
[1] https://dronedj.com/2023/09/19/zipline-earns-faa-bvlos-exemp...
Zipline is an FAA-certificated Part 135 operator and will use its Sparrow drone to release the payload via parachute.
Drones work until drone-specific AA is developed, and then it will be the same race we see between tanks and anti-tank weapons.
Drone specific AA will be very difficult.
And for now, anti-drone AA is difficult. But not unsolvable. Jamming, small caliber radar controlled AA guns. Point defense weapons can shoot down cruise missiles and even artillery shells. Applying the same principle at slower drones isn't that hard.
And I didn't make any demands, not sure how you woupd read that into my answers to a thread started with "dropping stuff from drones is an attack that cannot be countered". People didn't learn anything it seems, first tanks were obsolete, until Ukraine wanted every single one of them. Then modern AA made fighters and helicopters obsolete, only to be replaced by drones as the latest shit. Those arguments are just cheerleading whatever is en vogue and hyped.
Tanks being obsolete is… not clear. Tanks vs. western anti tank missiles and drones dropping grenades does feel like a terrible ROI but they are still useful. Russia doesn’t have these things at the same level of efficacy so tanks are perhaps more valuable for Ukraine to have.
Helicopters and fighters are in the same boat. They’re useful, but vulnerable and expensive. The thing about drones is they cost $200 to take out weapons that cost up to millions of dollars.
It is much harder to stop a small drone attacking a mobile position than it is to establish a large AA battery that defends against missiles. Missile AA is for protected largely stationary high strategic value targets. Drone AA has to be for small tactical level targets on the go. Way harder.
Offensive is much more difficult, as it needs to be coordinated with ground forces that can be impeded by mine fields. It is also easier for prepared defense lines to stop drones than it is for an offensive operation in the open to defend against them.
Ukraine vs Russia seems more asymmetric. For instance, Russia can be an existential threat to Ukraine, but the positions can not be easily reversed since Russia has nuclear weapons. While they wouldn't want to deploy them, they'd rather do that than lose Moscow.
Asymmetric warfare makes use of a great number of things, which wouldn't be very cost-effective in a battle of equals. For instance all the insurgents that use IEDs to harass checkpoints, would probably rather use factory made air-craft delivered ordinance.
Human-in-the-loop ethical concerns aside: a highly industrial power can fully automate the entire process and massively scale up from individual-pilot controlled prosumer drones.
Imagine a high-altitude loitering spotter-drone that autonomously identifies any tanks with open hatches and tasks smaller multirotor drones to precisely drop small munitions. You may take out an entire tank battalion for less than the cost of a couple of traditional air-to-surface missile without putting your personnel in harm's way. Future wars will be horrifying for infantry and ground vehicles.
And the safe zone does not start at 6m.
That's what really needs solving for mass drones to take off.
However this FAA approval is apparently for the Gen1 fixed wing plane (which is quieter than a drone anyway). Their Gen2 "drone" design is barely audible.
You could fail-safe this by adding parachute pyrotechnics which require an active command signal to not deploy: that way the worst case total electrical failure of a drone would immediately deploy chutes to slow it down.
This seems like a much more acceptable control then the failure mode of a car: which weighs 2 tons and contrary to popular belief only stays on roads by convention.
I assume given the 5m radius for drops they’re going to be operating in places that mostly have low density though. I’d also assume that they’d plan flight paths to be as safe as possible.
The words of a man who's never experienced rapid, unexpected, uncontrollable "drone flyaway". And yes, I have a modern, very capable drone and I'm not a complete idiot. Sometimes they just go... crazy.