software autonomy uav

First-responder delivery drone

Type an address into a browser; the aircraft flies there.

The problem

Getting a small payload to a street address quickly, dispatched by someone who is not a drone operator.

What I did

Built 4 subsystems: MAVLink telemetry including arm and disarm, address-to-coordinate resolution and autonomous navigation, a cellular link, and live video to the ground station.

What happened

A drone deployable to an address from any computer over a cellular link, with live video and telemetry, flown autonomously 4 times.

What I learned

It flew autonomously 4 times and no first-responder organisation ever trialled it. The lesson I took is that the hard part of this project was never the software.