Amazon's drone just accomplished its first real delivery

The future is here...if you live in England's Cambridge.
 By 
Raymond Wong
 on 
Original image replaced with Mashable logo
Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

Amazon's one step closer towards using drones to deliver packages to customers.

CEO Jeff Bezos revealed on Wednesday the company's Prime Air trial service successfully delivered a package by drone in a 13-minute flight on Dec. 7 in England's Cambridge region.

"Customers will choose from a selection of thousands of items tucked away in a Prime Air fulfillment center tucked away just over the horizon from their homes" Amazon says in a video.

In the video, we learn a little bit more about how the drones are deployed after an order is placed.

"Moments after receiving an order, an electrically-powered Amazon drone makes its way down an automated track and then rises into the sky with the customer's package on board."

The drones are guided by GPS and fully autonomous and fly at under 400 feet, and can carry a payloads of up to five pounds.

For the time being, Amazon's only using its drones to deliver packages to two (that's not a typo) customers.

Amazon says it'll expand its trial drone delivery service to "dozens of customers living within several miles of our UK facility" in the coming months, with expansion to hundreds more in the future.

Original image replaced with Mashable logo
Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

Amazon Prime Air's successful trial with its two customers in England could bode well for the future of delivery drones. The company says it has development centers in the U.S., UK, Austria and Israel and is testing more in other locations across the globe.

The challenge, of course, is getting approval from regulators and policymakers, like the Federal Aviation Administration to clear the drones once they've been proven safe.

Topics Amazon

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Raymond Wong

Raymond Wong is Mashable's Senior Tech Correspondent. He reviews gadgets and tech toys and analyzes the tech industry. Raymond's also a bit of a camera geek, gamer, and fine chocolate lover. Before arriving at Mashable, he was the Deputy Editor of NBC Universal's tech publication DVICE. His writing has appeared on G4TV, BGR, Yahoo and Ubergizmo, to name a few. You can follow Raymond on Twitter @raywongy or Instagram @sourlemons.

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