First order delivery with Amazon Prime Air drone. December 7, 2016, Cambridge (UK). It took 13 minutes

to deliver the goods (Fire TV and a pack of popcorn). In preparation for launching the unmanned Prime Air delivery service , Amazon is looking for ways to protect air 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 event of threats to an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) are described in US Patent No. 9524648 , published December 20, 2016 (application filed November 17, 2014).

Prime Air Delivery Service

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


The Prime Air drone's landing site at the buyer's home. December 7, 2016

In order to meet the requirement for fast UAV delivery, the cargo should be lighter than 2.26 kg, placed in a shipping container and within a radius of 16 km from the Amazon warehouse. According to statistics, 86% of products from the Amazon store meet the specified criteria.

Delivery of the first order, December 7, 2016

On December 7, 2016, the Prime Air drone delivered the first order to a resident of Cambridge (UK). This historic event was recorded from an onboard drone video camera .

Drones will follow each other

Amazon patent describes a UAV operation method with establishing 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, an attacker will not be able to spoof navigation information so easily: for this, he will have to hack the entire UAV network at once or disconnect 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 instantly switches to fail-safe mode. Landing, emergency mode is activated when the drone transmits a distress signal and its coordinates to other drones in the UAV network and to the administrator in the Amazon control center.

The fact of compromising the navigation system can be determined by calculating the difference in the direction and speed of movement, which give the first and second navigation system. That is, the second (“control”) UAV is able to check whether the course of a suspicious UAV corresponds to the coordinates indicated 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 roll sensor, a clock, a speed measuring device and an altimeter.

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

For reconciliation of navigation data between 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 to verify the coordinates from satellites, the readings of altitude sensors from the first and second UAVs. The second device can determine suspicious activity on the first device even on the basis of the load of its computing resources: processor, memory, input-output interfaces.

The patent describes various assistance to the affected drone from other UAVs, including charging its batteries offline by other UAVs flying by. Thus, if the device returns light from the client, and it still has a large battery charge, then it can land and share energy with the victim, and then fly on.

Other assistance is also provided, including forcibly restarting the computer or individual systems of the victim, using an air cushion, foam, parachute, bumper or activating the automatic rotation mode for one or several screws (apparently, this part of the patent describes the assistance to the affected UAV, who has not yet landed or caught fire, or is moving uncontrollably at the rate of 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 clearly show how the drone should act in the event of other emergencies. For example, if he finds an arrow flying past, then the safe landing mode must be activated. That is, an attacker does not need to aim directly at expensive equipment and disable it in order to steal goods. You can just shoot nearby, and then deal with the police for theft. Amazon will keep a healthy machine.

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


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