Delivery of the first order besplatilniki Amazon Prime Air. December 7, 2016, the area of ​​Cambridge (United Kingdom). Delivery of goods (Fire TV and a pack of popcorn) took 13 minutes



In preparation for the launch of Prime Air unmanned delivery service, Amazon is looking for ways to protect airborne drones from vandalism. The company thinks through every little thing, including the behavior of the drone in case of detection of a flying arrow.



Countermeasures in the case of threats to an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) are described in US Pat. No. 9,524,648 , published December 20, 2016 (application filed November 17, 2014).

Prime Air Delivery Service

According to the original plan , Prime Air drones will deliver the purchases to the door of the house within 30 minutes after the order.

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Landing spot for Prime Air drone. December 7, 2016



In order to meet the requirement of fast delivery of a UAV, the load should be 2.26 kg lighter, fit into a container for delivery and be within a radius of 16 km from the Amazon warehouse. According to statistics, 86% of goods from the Amazon store meet specified criteria.



Delivery of the first order, December 7, 2016



On December 7, 2016, Prime Air drone delivered the first order to a resident of Cambridge (United Kingdom). This historic event is recorded from the drone’s on-board video camera .

UAVs will follow each other

Amazon patent describes a UAV operation method with the establishment of a communication interface in a mesh network with many other drones. To protect against interception, the navigation system will verify the navigation data with other sources, including those received from other devices. Thus, the attacker will not be able to so easily spoof navigation information: for this, he will have to hack the entire UAV network at once or turn off communication with other drones.



If the computer detects that the data from the first and second navigation systems do not coincide with each other, then the device is instantly transferred to the safe landing mode (fail-safe). Landing, emergency mode is activated when the drone sends a distress signal and its coordinates to other drones in the UAV network and the administrator in the Amazon control center.



The fact of compromising the navigation system can be determined by calculating the difference in direction and speed of movement, which is given by the first and second navigation systems. That is, the second (“control”) UAV is able to check whether the course of a suspicious UAV corresponds to the coordinates specified in its navigation system.





Theoretically, one or several additional devices can be used to verify the data of the first and second UAVs: a compass, a gyroscope, an accelerometer, a tilt sensor, a clock, a speed measurement device and an altimeter.



After a safe landing, the device with a failed navigation system will be sent to the coordinates of the service center. Other (“healthy”) UAVs will inform the injured comrade control commands and flight coordinates. The patent also provides for monitoring the landing of a failed apparatus by other UAVs that make up the Amazon network.



For verification of navigation data between the devices, a special software and hardware complex is provided. In such a complex, the second navigation system of the first UAV will have access to the first navigation system of the second UAV and vice versa. The navigation computer uses the coordinates from satellites, readings of altitude sensors from the first and second UAVs for verification. The second device can detect suspicious activity on the first device even on the basis of loading its computational resources: processor, memory, input-output interfaces.



The patent describes various assistance to the affected UAV from other UAVs, including charging its batteries offline with other UAVs flying past. Thus, if the device comes back lightly from the client, and he still has a large battery charge, he can land and share with the victim with energy, and then fly on.



Other assistance is also provided, including forcing the computer or individual systems to restart the victim, using an airbag, foam, parachute, bumper, or activating the automatic rotation mode for one or more screws (apparently, this help describes the UAV, who has not yet landed or caught fire, or is moving uncontrollably along the course of a collision with an obstacle, or is falling uncontrollably).



It should be understood that in patents it is customary to describe any, even the most fantastic scenarios.

Arrow protection

The illustrations in the patent illustrate how a drone should act in case of other emergencies. For example, if he found an arrow flying past, then the safe landing mode must be activated. That is, the attacker does not necessarily need to aim directly at expensive equipment and disable it in order to steal the goods. You can just shoot close, and then deal with the police for theft. Amazon will keep a working machine.



The scheme of action in the event of an arrow shot is shown in the illustration.





After planting the emergency mode is activated. As mentioned above, in this mode, the affected device attracts the attention of the surrounding drones, which can begin to monitor it, so that the “Robin Hood” will not go unnoticed.