Drone delivery in Ongjin-gun, delivery to an island 50 km away, in 20 minutes

PAV Special Liberalization Zone Jawoldo-Ijakdo-Deokjeokdo offshore. [인천시]

# When the drone, which has flown 50km through the strong wind, lands on the island, a notification sound comes out. A person approaches, unlocks the lock, and pulls out the items loaded by the drone. It took about 20 minutes for the drone from Incheon Port to arrive at Deokjeokdo Island. It takes about 1 hour and 30 minutes by boat. This is a scene of drone delivery in an island area being promoted by Incheon City.

As Ongjin-gun, Incheon, has been selected as a special liberalization zone for personal air vehicles (PAV) by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, expectations for drone delivery to islands are growing. According to the city of Incheon on the 14th, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport recently designated Ongjin-gun, Jawol-do, Ijak-do, and Deokjeok-do, as PAV special liberalization zones. Earlier, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport began a contest to designate a special liberalization area for PAVs to foster commerce related to drones, taxis and delivery, when the Act on Promotion of Drone Use and Foundation Creation was enforced in May last year. After 7 months of evaluation, including document review, field inspection, and committee deliberation, Ongjin-gun Marine was finally selected as a special liberalization zone. The poem’s explanation is that the development of the tense machine was crucial to the selection. Incheon city’s prototype is smaller than a light car and weighs 400 kg. It can carry up to 90 kg and fly at a speed of about 50 km/h.

When designated as a special liberalization zone, the’special airworthiness certificate’, safety certification, and prior flight approval are exempted or mitigated. It also deviates from the demonstration period that takes about 5 months. Following the indoor test, the city plans to conduct a demonstration flight over Jawol Island after completing the outdoor flight test. The city of Incheon plans to support the private air vehicle business such as emergency relief and delivery of goods and tourism product development in the future by taking advantage of the geographical characteristics of 168 islands.

Pablo Airlines’ drone delivering medicines to Jawoldo. [인천시]

Earlier, Incheon City conducted a test flight with Pablo Airlines in November of last year to deliver medicines and science kits to the island in two vertical take-off and landing drones. The two drones departing from the Incheon New Port pier broke through strong winds and flew about 80 km and 40 km, respectively, at a speed of 18 to 30 m per second, and landed on Jawoldo and Yeongheungdo. It was the longest-distance record in Korea. At the time, a drone with a width of 3.6m and a weight of 12 kg took off and landed with a propeller like a multicopter (a drone with no wings and only a propeller), but after takeoff, the flight time and distance were adjusted by applying a method of creating lift with the wings. Raised.

An official from Incheon City said, “The goal is to ultimately ride individual aircraft,” and “We plan to increase the speed to more than 100 km/h before commercialization.” Regarding concerns such as the cost of transportation to the island, he said, “It is still in the development stage, so we will continue to think about the economic feasibility while developing technology.”

Reporter Shim Seok-yong [email protected]