The twin crashes of Amazon’s MK30 drones in Oregon occurred on Dec. 16, when both aircraft abruptly shut off mid-air and slammed into the ground.
— an avoidable disaster made worse by the company’s decision to remove a critical safety sensor, according to a report citing federal documents. The twin crashes of Amazon ’s MK30 drones in Oregon occurred just minutes apart on Dec.
16, when both aircraft abruptly shut off mid-air at an altitude of more than 200 feet and slammed into the ground,The autonomous drones incorrectly believed they had landed, triggering an automatic shutdown of their propellers while flying, according to the report. An investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board blamed the cause on faulty lidar readings made worse by the rain and a software tweak that increased the sensors’ sensitivity, Bloomberg reported.Amazon’s cutting-edge delivery drones fell from the sky during a December test flight after a software update made them vulnerable to rain, according to a report.The NTSB told The Post that the drones “erroneously determined they had touched down due to an incorrect altitude reading from a new software installation, which resulted in a loss of engine power.” In a potentially crucial misstep, Amazon had removed backup “squat switches” — metal prongs used in earlier models to physically confirm a landing — leaving the aircraft reliant solely on sensor input, according to Bloomberg. The absence of this fail-safe likely contributed to the crashes, three people briefed on the matter told Bloomberg.Sheikh who owns $400M Qatari jet gifted to Trump is embroiled in $20M luxury hotel spat “Statements that assume that replacing one system with another would have prevented an accident in the past is irresponsible.”First unveiled by then-CEO Jeff Bezos in 2013, the drone initiative was billed as a technological leap that would enable packages to be delivered in under 30 minutes.Two of Amazon’s MK30 drones crashed during a test flight just minutes apart in Oregon this past December, according to the report.Bezos predicted at the time that drones would be dropping packages within five years. That promise has yet to materialize. A 2021 crash at its Pendleton, Ore., test site sparked a fire. The December accidents led to a temporary pause in drone testing. Last year, the mayor of College Station, Texas, a town located around 100 miles northwest of Houston, wrote a letter to the FAA complaining thatThe MK30 drone, which replaced the earlier MK27 model, can fly up to 67 miles per hour and deliver packages within a 7.5-mile radius.While the MK27 relied on a combination of lidar and squat switches to confirm landings, the MK30 depends solely on camera-based computer vision and software redundancy to make that determination. Critics say the shift away from physical fail-safes reflects a broader industry trend toward streamlining hardware in favor of software solutions, often to cut weight and production costs.Instead, it hovers and drops packages from about 13 feet up — an operational change that reduces the risk of human contact with its now more-exposed propellers. Deliveries remain limited to College Station and the greater Phoenix area, with planned expansions to Kansas City, the Dallas area, San Antonio and international markets like the UK and Italy.Big Lots was 'too expensive' — the discounter's new owner saysTravis Kelce makes cheeky Taylor Swift joke at Patrick Mahomes’ charity gala as singer skips eventWatch Live: NJ Gov. Phil Murphy and NJ Transit CEO Kris Kolluri discuss rail strike Amazon’s cutting-edge delivery drones fell from the sky during a December test flight after a software update made them vulnerable to rain, according to a report.Two of Amazon’s MK30 drones crashed during a test flight just minutes apart in Oregon this past December, according to the report.
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