© Korea Post

Koreans may soon be receiving their mail from drones. According to a recent report from the Korea Post, they have successfully delivered mail to residents of Deukryang Island in South Jeolla Province. The agency also reports that they hope to implement the same services for the rest of country by 2022.  Drones have been used to deliver things before. Amazon and 7-Eleven’s drone delivery services are a couple of good examples, but what makes Korea’s mailing drones special is that they are designed to travel through mountains, hills and even bodies of water.

South Korea’s hilly and mountainous landscape is not kind to mailmen, and the same is true for the countries’ 3,400 or so islands and islets. In the case of Deukryang Island, mail carriers literally have to take a ship to deliver their daily load of mail.  They would take the ship to reach the mainland, take the mail and then return to the island to deliver it to the locals. Needless to say, such a process is both time consuming and expensive. The recent tests with drones was planned to address this issue.

The test began at a local port in Goheung, and from there, the drone flew to a community in Deukryang Island. The whole test lasted only 10 minutes, and the drone successfully carried a entire packet of mail and parcels that weighed around 8 kilograms.  The biggest challenge for the test was traveling through 4 kilometers of water at an altitude of around 50 meters. The drone was also fully automated throughout this entire process, and there had been concerns that the drone might deviate from its intended path.

Suffice to say, everything went as planned, and the Korea Post hopes that their drone delivery services will be in common use by 2022. To make this transition possible, the agency has begun creating drone flight and control systems, and are even planning to hire additional maintenance workers next year.  Additionally, the South Korean government also plans to invest over $1 billion in Korea’s drone industry over the next five years. This funding will be directed into drone technology research and development through 2022, including drones for mail delivery.

Aside from the South Korean public sector, national private sector enterprises are also eager to introduce drone delivery systems. Some companies are planning to imitate the drone services used in other countries, and many companies are hoping that new research will lead to new and profitable technological applications in  years to come.

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