Hey drone! Fetch me a wrench, a new shear pin, and more snacks, please

Aug 28, 2023

Need a certain wrench in the middle of a field? Call a drone.

Lost a shear pin? Call a drone.

Finished your lunch in the cab and it’s only 10 am? Call a drone. Or more likely, just open the app or your phone’s virtual assistant and order that second lunch.

Okay, it may be many years before this is actually possible, or practical, in a farm field or pasture setting, but the drone delivery concept is moving toward reality in another setting where people find themselves surrounded by acres of grass and a long walk from what it is they’re looking for: golf courses.

Kansas-based agricultural drone company AgEagle and Valqari, a Chicago-based company that has patented a drone delivery landing station, announced this week that they’ve are producing “a turnkey, fully automated, on-demand drone delivery system” for ordering and delivering food and beverages to golfers while they are playing on a golf course.

The two companies demonstrated the technology at the Sun City Country Club in Arizona earlier this week.

“A food and beverage order was placed via a Valqari Drone Delivery Station positioned just outside the clubhouse restaurant,” they explain. “The delivery drone was called to pick-up the order and fly it to another Drone Delivery Station located on the course. Once the drone released the package and departed, the Drone Delivery Station was activated, relocating the package from the top of the station to a lower compartment for the golfer to securely retrieve the order.”

From cold beer and hotdogs to frozen vaccines and test swabs, a Canadian drone company is testing the use of drones for delivering Covid-19-related supplies to remote communities.

Toronto-based Drone Delivery Canada (DDC) says it’s in discussions with federal and provincial agencies regarding opportunities for its patented drone delivery system for the healthcare field.

The company says it’s been flying pandemic-related supplies to Beausoleil First Nation and Georgina Island First Nation in Ontario since last summer. The Sparrow drones used in both communities are capable of delivering medical supplies, PPE, test kits, and vaccines, with a 30-kilometre, one-way range when carrying 10 pounds of payload.

“The healthcare industry is a market where we see significant potential future opportunity because it is a perfect fit for what our system does best – access to remote locations, time-critical deliveries, and limiting person-to-person contact. Since our cargo goes inside the drone, and we use a patented depot-to-depot DroneSpot network configuration, this results in a safe and secure solution, addressing unique needs for high-value and high-risk cargo, as is typical in healthcare, especially for vaccines,” says Michael Zahra, president & CEO of DDC.

These are just two examples. There are probably others.

It’s been years since Amazon and others gained publicity testing drone deliveries in large cities, but as we see the concept tried in other fields and outside of dense urban areas, perhaps we’ll soon see drones delivering tools or lunch pails to farm fields.