Unmanned Cargo Aircraft??
 

A Startup’s Plan To Cut Air Freight Costs In Half With 777-Size Drones

In 2020, Natilus’s huge unmanned planes could carry 200,000 pounds of goods across the world. But first, a 30-foot prototype must pass test runs.

http://https://www.fastcompany.com/3...77-size-drones

Brand new airframer plans to get a remote piloted, widebody, amphibious freighter flying in 3 years with less than $1M invested so far?

That's cute.

Three millennials in sports shirts.

Ten out of ten for fundraising skills, though.....

It would be more believable if it was round and edible , as this is such a pie-in-the-Sky idea , anyone with knowledge of logistics , engineering , industry best practices and a bit of pragmatism would soon realise that this idea will never materialise in it's current flawed form. No business case here.

LOL! One reason at my age I won't ever fly for a cargo outfit. You guys flying for FedEx/UPS or Kalita are the last of the " stage coach drivers". I work with drones a lot and the technology and enthusiasm of the younger gen doing it are amazing. I figure they drone a Van then move on up the food chain…..then pax ops. ;-)

I love this:
Well, because water landing rights for an amphibious 300,000# airfreighter are gonna be simple! Just land right there in Long Beach harbor and taxi on up to the docks. I'm sure such landing rights are gonna be just as simple in China, India, UAE, etc., because coordinating with the ships going in and out of those ports are going to be a snap.

Of course, there's also never bad weather or poor sea conditions right there by the docks.

All of which is just gonna save so much time and money!

I can't wait to see how the longshoremen "revolutionize" the freight industry after this thing arrives.

Good luck, and party on dudes.

Better off to retrofit a 777 instead of trying to make an all new airplane.

These designers are about to have a very painful learning experience.

Cessna Caravans already have an optionally piloted version for military use.

It's only a matter of time.

Hell, I'm sure Amazon is looking into it.

Like I've said before, just because the pilot(s) aren't in the cockpit doesn't mean they are out of the loop. You'll still need pilots somewhere. I for one would be interested in converting a room in my house to a remote cockpit office.

I could fly a morning shift from home then head over to my hangar (1 mile from my house), pull out the bug smasher and fly to lunch. I don't need to go to the big airport and deal with that crap anymore. Sleep in my own bed, hell yeah.

And, of course, the satellite time and bandwidth to operate these things transocean is just going to be so much cheaper than paying pilots.

I expect that satellite time and bandwidth will be an order of magnitude less expensive than pilots. Please correct my very rough math: ~5000 pilots at $200,000k/yr is $1B. This does not include healthcare, or travel costs, or lost cargo space, and likely several other costs.

SpaceX launches rockets to space, which then deploy several satellites, and steer themselves to land vertically on a barge floating in the ocean. I don't in the least doubt that someone, whether it be Boeing, Airbus, or a startup, will produce autonomous aircraft within the next 10 years.

I don't have to like the idea of non-piloted airplanes, but it seems to me best to hope for the best and prepare for the worst.