Royal Mail delivers first package by drone to Scottish Isle of Mull

In the United Kingdom, the Royal Mail postal service delivered the first package by drone to the Scottish isle of Mull.

Royal Mail delivers first package by drone to Scottish Isle of Mull

To deliver a package to a resident of the Scottish Isle of Mull is an hour by ferry from the mainland plus probably another hour over the island's narrow winding roads. However, a drone can complete the same delivery much faster as Britain's Royal Mail recently discovered.

The company recently completed the first successful Delivery by Drone of a a package containing hoodie sweatshirt. The delivery marked the first in a series of tests that the Royal Mail will undertake in the more remote parts of the country.

“We're looking at ways we can connect all of our customers faster,” said Nick Landon, chief commercial officer of the postal service. “Drones have a really good potential to allow us to do that.”

According to Bloomberg, the Royal Mail has seen a sharp drop in letter writing in favor of package deliveries resulting from the boom in online sales. The service needs to adjust its business accordingly and drones are an important step in that direction.

The Royal Mail partnered with the company What3Words, a location service that has divided the entire planet into 57 trillion three-by-three-meter squares and given everyone a unique three-word combination. For the first drone delivery by the Royal Mail, the delivery address was clip.nurtures.shortage, which is near the lighthouse on Mull's northern coast.

The make the drone deliveries, the Royal Mail has asked the residents to identify suitable spots on their properties for a drone to land to deliver the parcels

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Photo credit: Chris Gorman / Big Ladder