Skyports’ Scottish school meal delivery tapped for national award

A trial program overseen by the UK’s Skyports Drone Services in Scotland is in the running for a national award for its efforts in pioneering UAV transport of meals to remote Highland schools.

Launched last June, the Skyports-assisted test project has been using drones to shuttle lunches from the town of Orban to the Lochnell Primary School about 1.5 kilometers north. Though still in its early evaluation stages, the scheme introduced by the local Argyll and Bute Council is the first attempt in the UK to supply meals for students in remote schools using UAVs.

If successful, the program could be broadened to other localities in Scotland’s Highlands and Hebrides islands.

Read more: Skyports tests drone deliveries of meals to schools in Scotland

The governing Argyll and Bute Council has been exploring ways to use UAVs to overcome recurring challenges in serving its rural and island communities. Like several other administrations across Scotland, it has begun testing drones for delivery of medical supplies, mail, and now school meals as a potential option to slow and disruption-prone road and sea transportation.

Skyports has been involved in many of those schemes, including one announced just last month to provide delivery of post for the Royal Mail within the Orkney islands. 

The company’s transport of school meals under the Argyll and Bute program is now up for an award in the in the Innovation and Community Focus category in the Facility Management awards – an annual event run by Scotland’s Assist FM organization, which assists local administrations with logistics, transport, infrastructure, and other initiatives.

Under its pioneering trial, Skyport drones carry maximum 3 lbs payloads of lunches to Lochnell Primary. Those hauls are clearly not enough to provide for all students there, but they are allowing officials to gauge how efficient test shuttles are operating, and whether they can be scaled to the 23 inhabited islands and rural Highland communities in the region.

“We’re working hard to deliver real opportunities for communities to help grow the local economy by providing innovative solutions in service delivery and design,” said deputy council leader Gary Mulvaney of the various drone-driven initiatives Argyll and Bute has undertaken.

Skyports is also playing a central role in the conception and construction of the the West Coast Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Innovation Logistics Hub being built at the Orban Airport. That multi-functional drone services and training facility is another example of how Scottish officials are embracing drone tech within a broader modernization effort. 

The project is being financed in part by the $85.5 million Argyll and Bute Rural Growth Deal, as well as funds from the UK’s $2.4 billion development fund for Scotland. The Orban drone hub is expected to be completed by March 2025.

Read: Scotland’s medical drone network opens phase two development 

Through its partnership with Skyports, Argyll and Bute officials aim to prove use of drones can cut costs in fulfilling the Scottish Government’s pledge to provide free school meals to all elementary students – even in far-flung establishments that have no no-site kitchens of their own.