In an age where most of the world’s leading tech startups are clustered in Silicon Valley, there’s one innovative arena in which the United States is markedly behind: the use of drones.
As of the week of July 5–11, Switzerland’s postal service started testing the use of drones to deliver emergency supplies, geared for service when areas of the mountainous country are cut off from the rest of the world by a natural disaster.
Each of the Matternet drones, used by Swiss Post, can carry two pounds of freight.
The tests are the first-step toward integrating drones as a mainstay of the delivery system, a goal that remains implausible at the moment due to technical limitations like the strength of batteries and the management of crowded airspace.
Matternet Swiss Post drone. Swiss Post/Yushiko Kusano
