On 17 January 2025, Amazon announced the suspension of its drone delivery operations in Usa. The experimental drone delivery service, launched in December 2022, was operational in College Station, Texas, and the West Valley Phoenix Metro Area in Arizona. In December 2024, two of Amazon's latest MK30 drones crashed during test flights at Pendleton Airport in Oregon, a site used by the company for drone trials. One of the drones caught fire after hitting the ground. Amazon attributed the crashes to a software issue related to light rain conditions during the flights.
Although the company stated that these incidents were not the primary reason for halting the service, it is currently working on a software update to address the problem. Once the update is implemented, Amazon will need approval from the Federal Aviation Administration before resuming drone operations. This is not the first hurdle faced by Amazon's Prime Air autonomous drone delivery programme. Earlier in 2024, the company shut down Prime Air operations in California. In September of the same year, two drones collided mid-air during a test simulating a propeller failure. These incidents, along with the recent suspension, mark a setback in Amazon's ambitious goal of delivering 500 million parcels annually via drones by the end of the decade.
