Australians Are Furious About Google's Delivery Drone

Sourced from QRes#7311

Google's parent company Alphabet Inc. is on the verge of launching what the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) says will be the world’s first commercial drone delivery service in Australia.

Wing, a subsidiary of Alphabet has been testing its drone delivery service over Bonython, a suburb of Tuggeranong, a township in southern Canberra. The year-long trial, called Project Wing, wrapped up last week; now the company is planning for a commercial launch in June.

Wing says its drones will be able to deliver small items, such as food and medication, but residents of Canberra, where the program was tested and will soon be ready for commercial flight, are furious about drones buzzing above.

Alphabet and Wing are expected to face a fierce fight before the delivery program takes off, according to ABC.

In response to the public backlash, Wing recently tested a quieter version of its delivery drone.

“We’re trying to be as transparent and as open as we can,” Project Wing CEO James Burgess told the Canberra Times.

Many Bonython residents told local Government officials the invasive drones had brought people to madness, and residents told police if the government did not intervene, they would shoot the drones out of the sky.

"It is not inevitable, if the Government can be convinced that the great majority of Canberrans don't want it," local Neville Sheather said.

Sheather leads Bonython Against Drones, a group that is trying to stop the progress of Alphabet and Wing from commercializing the delivery service.

Even some advocates of drones, like Professor Roger Clarke, have said Project Wing had developed too quickly.

"We've got to get the different segments of the public represented in these discussions, and they haven't been," Professor Clarke said.

Clarke said Project Wing had been rushed through testing and is not following the traditional process of assessing new technologies.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-03-10/australians-are-furious-about-googles-delivery-drone