Amazon is trying to justify itself, and announced that this was not the “primary reason.” However, following the accident of two drones in December in the state of Oregon, its Prime Air delivery service has suspended its operations. A new shutdown, announced by Bloomberg, deemed “voluntary” by an Amazon spokesperson, who stressed that the company was making “software modifications to the drone”.
The shutdown may take a few days, however, since the spokesperson explained that “employees at the drone sites, who were informed of the information on Friday, will continue to be paid during the break”. Amazon will also and above all depend on the green light from the Federal Aviation Administration, which will certainly not give its approval without confirmation that the danger has been averted.
The American air police have reason to be vigilant. Of the two drones lost in December, one of them had caught fire. The nature of their incident is uncertain, but Bloomberg pointed to the weather as a trigger. The drones' navigation software was reportedly unable to withstand a light rain that fell at the same time as their flight, while the model in question, the MK30, has long been presented by the company as being capable of operating in such conditions.
The two drones in question are indeed MK30s, a new generation of drones presented in 2022, and launched in 2023. Despite its larger size and lighter weight than the old MK27, it has not failed to encounter problems. A few months before the incident in the rain, two other drones collided, an episode that Amazon had protected itself from by explaining that it was a test flight, and that this kind of incident allowed them to develop the system.
Prime Air's difficulties do not stop there, since the subsidiary of the American giant must also deal with poor reception from local residents, exhausted by the noise of the aircraft. In College Station, a small Texan town where Amazon has set up shop, the authorities alerted regulators about the more than 200 flights per day of drones over houses, disturbing the peace of the residents.
First flight in Italy
This "giant hive", as the locals call it, has already forced the service to pack its bags. An episode that dates back to April 2024, when a similar protest movement broke out in the town of Lockeford in California. This did not prevent Amazon from setting up in Europe, where despite a more timid installation than expected, Prime Air successfully completed its first flights in Italy, in the town of San Salvo. A way to divert attention from the service in the United Kingdom, where the deployment seems to have stopped since the latest announcements last August.
Source: Bloomberg
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