Ships at sea are literally islands unto themselves. If what you need isn’t on board, good luck getting it in the middle of the Pacific. As such, most ships are really well equipped with spare parts and even with raw materials and the tools needed to fabricate most of what they can’t store, and mariners are famed for their ability to make do with what they’ve got.
But as self-sufficient as a ship at sea might be, the unexpected can always happen. A vital system could fail for lack of a simple spare part, at best resulting in a delay for the shipping company and at worst putting the crew in mortal danger. Another vessel can be dispatched to assist, or if the ship is close enough ashore a helicopter rendezvous might be arranged. Expensive options both, which is why some shipping companies are experimenting with drone deliveries to and from ships at sea.
“Cookie Drone off the Starboard Beam!”
We’ve discussed plans for heavy-lift drones for rapid transoceanic freight, but ship-to-shore and shore-to-ship deliveries are perhaps more compelling use cases for aerial support of shipping. While it’s true that the cases where a ship at sea needs support from shore are rare, there are more common and prosaic transportation needs that could be addressed by drones.
At the risk of stating the painfully obvious, ships are big. Really big. Modern vessels are among the largest moving objects ever made, and some ports can’t even accommodate them. Some, like supertankers, would make lousy neighbors even if they…
The post Automate the Freight: Maritime Drone Deliveries appeared first on FeedBox.