Haye Kesteloo is the Editor in Chief and Main Writer at DroneDJ, where he covers all drone-related news and writes product reviews. He also contributes to the other sites in the 9to5Mac group such as; 9to5Mac, 9to5Google, 9to5Toys, and Electrek.
Haye can be reached at haye@dronedj.com or @hayekesteloo
The Dutch drone pilot who was arrested after taking aerial photos with his drone from Tahrir square in Cairo has now been released from jail according to the Dutch foreign ministry.
People are continuously finding new ways to use drones. Take a look at this example where biologists now use a drone to ‘weigh’ whales from above. I mean, we have seen researchers using drones to collect whale snot in the past, but to weigh a whale with help of an unmanned aircraft is novel.
We just got an email from Skydio, and apparently, the first 2019 batch of Skydio 2s are already sold out. The initial batch is scheduled to be shipped well before the holidays. Congrats to those of you who reserved their Skydio 2 drone on time. For the ones who missed out, no worries. A second batch will be available to ship in January 2020. The new Skydio sells for $999 and can be bought with a Controller and a Skydio Beacon. Both sell for an additional $149 each.
Here’s a cool story of drones being used for good! A developer is using aerial images taken with a drone, a DJI Mavic Pro (DJI, Amazon
UPS has received FAA approval for drone deliveries in the US through a Part 135 certification. The logistics company is now allowed to fly drones carrying more than 55 lbs, fly drones at night, and fly them beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS).
If you have never experienced Skydio’s obstacle avoidance and self-flying capability, you’re in for a treat. The first time I hand-launched the original Skydio R1, I was blown away. The drone took off from my hand, flew about five feet away from me at a slightly higher elevation, turned around, “looked” at me, and simply followed my every move. It seemed eerily easy and natural for the unmanned aircraft to do so. This was with the R1, mind you, not the smaller, lighter, and much, much smarter Skydio 2 that launched earlier today. Let’s take a closer look at how the Skydio 2 drone is able to fly autonomously.
Finally, it is here! The all-new and vastly improved Skydio 2 drone. The long-awaited successor to the ground-breaking Skydio R1 autonomously-flying drone that was introduced in early 2018. The new Skydio 2 is designed and built right here in the USA and it competes head-on with the DJI Mavic 2 Pro.
Heliguy — one of the world’s leading drone suppliers — has opened in Dallas as part of a major expansion into the US, it was revealed at DJI’s AirWorks conference.
With more than a decade of experience in the UAS industry and having established themselves as one of DJI’s largest and most trusted European enterprise channel partners, Heliguy has decided that the time is right to bring its award-winning model of service and support to America.
Yuneec and Leica Camera AG announced the beginning of a strategic technology partnership. The first result of this collaboration was presented yesterday in the form of the Typhoon H3 with ION L1 Pro camera. It is a drone equipped with a high-end 1″ sensor camera that was specially developed for sophisticated aerial photography and, thanks to Leica photo-engineering technology, also meets the highest standards of quality.
The Australia-based Ripper Group, known for their drones that can identify sharks, has partnered with Amazon to deliver a crocodile-spotting drone service to beaches in Australia.
DJI commits drone technology to increase support for national disaster response efforts. New DJI Disaster Relief Program will provide emergency responders with DJI drone technology and training. The DJI Disaster Relief Program was announced at AirWorks 2019, DJI’s annual commercial drone conference.
DJI introduces Phantom 4 Multispectral for precision agriculture and land management. According to the drone maker, it is the world’s first integrated multispectral imaging drone built to power farming’s next generation.
DJI introduces innovative tools and technologies for the commercial drone industry at DJI AirWorks. New drones for agriculture and a disaster relief program highlight the transformative role DJI drones play in our skies every day.
Lawmakers from both the Republican and Democratic sides have introduced legislation, titled the American Security Drone Act 2019, on Wednesday that aims to stop federal agencies from purchasing DJI and other drones manufactured in China or any other country that is considered a national-security risk. Many federal departments and agencies are already using DJI drones, so needless to say that if this bill would pass, it would affect many different parts of the federal government.
Next week DJI Airworks 2019 will kick off at the Westin Bonaventura in downtown Los Angeles. The annual DJI event will start with a media day on Monday and will officially be open from Tuesday, September 24th through Thursday, 26th to anybody with a commercial interest in drones. In an email from DJI about Airworks, the drone maker included an image of a tractor in a field with the message that “The future of smart farming is almost here”, hinting at the possibility that they will introduce new payloads or software to help farmers optimize their fields and crops. We will be attending the event the entire week and will report any DJI news here on DroneDJ, so stay tuned.
Ahead of its annual Airworks event in Los Angeles, DJI announces two new payloads powered by DJI Skyport, the U10 AUV Based Laser Methane Leakage Detector and the Wingsland z15 Gimbal Spotlight for Matrice drones. These payloads are aimed at enterprise customers.
It seems that the new Skydio 2 drone will be released shortly. In an email from the American drone maker, the company shared a number of test photos to show off the drone’s photo-taking capabilities. Skydio says that they have an entirely new camera for the Skydio 2 and that we can expect incredible image and video-taking performance from it. In the text and the comments on Facebook, they seem to indicate that we can expect the drone to be released shortly.
FPV drone pilot Andre Larsen from Norway captured this very cool shot of somebody jumping off a boat into the water. As Larsen flew his FPV drone closer to the action, a splash of water hit his unmanned aircraft, which then spun out of control and ended up in the water as well. The waterproof action cam kept filming as the unmanned aircraft instantly went from droning to drowning.
A quick-thinking drone pilot used the speaker on the Mavic 2 Enterprise to warn a surfer of an approaching shark at a beach south of Wollongong, Australia. After hearing the warning the surfer quickly paddled back to shore, while the shark swam off into deeper waters.
The Area 51 airspace will be closed to helicopters and drones during Storm Area 51 event. The planned event to “See them aliens” started out as a joke on Facebook, but has morphed into a potentially dangerous situation. More than 2 million people have said that they would attend the event, and as a precaution, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has issued two temporary flight restrictions (TFRs) for the airspace around Area 51 in Nevada for helicopters and drones starting this week. The infamous Area 51 is controlled by the US Department of Defense and the Department of Energy.
Roughly two weeks ago we wrote this piece on the status and price increases of DJI drones in the official DJI online store. As a result of the trade war tariffs, DJI increased the prices on a range of its products, including the DJI Mavic 2, DJI Care Refresh, and batteries for the Mavic and Phantom series. At the same time, the Chinese drone maker also removed all of the DJI Phantom 4 series from their official online store. However, that has now changed. The DJI Phantom 4 Pro V2.0 returns to the DJI online store albeit at a higher price and unfortunately is still out of stock. The other Phantoms are still MIA.
A couple of weeks ago climate change activists, who are part of the Extinction Rebellion movement, had announced that they would be using toy drones to disrupt air traffic at Heathrow Airport in the UK today. The operation was called Heathrow Pause. However, British police made a number of arrests leading up to the planned disruption and also used jamming technology to prevent drones from taking off earlier today.
DJI, the world’s leader in civilian drones and aerial imaging technology, and Delair, a leading provider of visual data management solutions for enterprise, today announced a partnership that will see the two companies collaborate on enhanced and integrated solutions for visual data collection and analysis for businesses. The partnership will include an agreement for Delair to sell DJI products through its worldwide sales channel, along with launching a relationship to build compatibility across platforms.
DJI Spark and DJI Mavic drone models are a permanent part of LAPD’s arsenal since Tuesday this week, despite opposition from privacy advocates who are afraid that the unmanned aircraft will become a spying tool for the LA police force.