The
financial capital, notorious for its traffic snarls, has achieved a
first in the country after a city-based pizza outlet used an unmanned
drone to execute a delivery by taking the aerial route recently.
"All
of us had read about (global e-commerce giant) Amazon's plans of using
drones. We successfully carried out a test-delivery by sending a pizza
to a customer located 1.5 km away from our outlet on May 11,"
Francesco's Pizzeria chief executive Mikhel Rajani said on Wednesday.
He stressed that this was only a test-flight but its results confirm that it can be used routinely in a few years.
A
four-rotor drone took off with the order from its outlet in central
Mumbai's Lower Parel area and delivered it to a high-rise building in
adjacent Worli area, Rajani said, claiming that it is for the first time
that the ubiquitous drone has been used for such a purpose in the
country.
The eatery, which has been
in operations for two years, has made a video of the delivery, he said,
adding an auto engineer friend helped with making the flight possible.
Rajani,
who comes from a family that is into textiles, said the drone saves
time and costs for a company like his, which would otherwise depend on a
two-wheeler borne agent to deliver the pizzas.
"What
we have done now will be common place in the next four-five years," he
said, adding every such customised drone costs around USD 2,000.
At
present, there are certain restrictions on the regulatory front like
the drone not allowed to fly above 400 ft altitude and barred from
flying over security establishments, he said, adding the American
Federal Aviation Authority's regulations on usage of drones, expected
next year, will help.
Apart from that
there are technical difficulties like a limited operating radius of 8
km after which the batteries go dry, he said, adding proper
infrastructure like having charging stations can help.
Even
though the four-rotor version drone had a limited carrying capacity, he
said the payload capacity can be increased to up to 8 kg in case of a
an eight-rotor drone.
Beyond the
strategic applications, the drones are increasingly being used for a
cross variety of purposes especially the ones centred around getting
aerial imagery like getting videos at weddings, political rallies etc.
At
present, Rajani said, the drones are being operated manually but added
in future, we can have drones fly by themselves on predetermined flight
paths made using GPS data.
During the
test-flight, the drone picked up a box containing the pizza but bigger
drones will be easily able to lift the special flask box which can
protect the pizza from the atmospheric elements, he said.
Posted by : Gizmeon
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