Heavy Lift Drones

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Sep 16

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Large quadcopter drone carrying a man suspended in midair

Heavy Lift Drones · Counter-Drone

Korean Drug Lord's Drone Jailbreak Undone by a Viral Test Flight

Park Wang-yeol planned to fly out of a Philippine prison hanging from a 165-pound-capacity drone. A viral rehearsal clip killed the plot.

Haye KestelooSep 165 min read

Man holding a heavy-lift hexacopter drone overhead in a grass field

Technology

DARPA Runner-Up MTech Missed 4:1 By One Overheating Motor

Luke Maximo Bell's build log for MTech's second-place DARPA Lift Challenge run shows heat, not battery capacity, ended the team's 4:1 attempt in Dayton.

Haye KestelooSep 15

AVIDrone Katana unmanned helicopter drone hovering against a clear blue sky, showing its main rotor, long tail boom, tail rotor and four-legged landing gear

Technology

DARPA Doubles Lift Challenge Payload After 5 Of 76 Teams Scored

DARPA brings the Lift Challenge back in summer 2028 with the minimum payload doubled to 220 pounds and the course doubled to 10 nautical miles.

Haye KestelooSep 1

Technology

DARPA Pays Half As A Conventional Helicopter Wins The Lift Challenge At 3.84:1

Avidrone Inc. won the DARPA Lift Challenge at a 3.84:1 payload-to-weight ratio with the Katana, a conventional single-rotor helicopter, and because nobody reached 4:1, the half-prize clause DroneXL reported last week cut every podium payout in two. The result says as much about energy density and American drone policy as it does about lift.

Haye KestelooAug 10

Three DARPA Lift Challenge team members in red shirts carry a long tubular heavy-lift drone airframe across the grass field at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force

Technology

DARPA Lift Challenge Opens In Dayton With A Prize Rule That Plans For Failure

More than 90 teams are flying the DARPA Lift Challenge at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force through August 9, chasing a 4:1 payload-to-weight ratio for a share of $6.5 million. DARPA's own prize rules cut the top three awards in half if nobody clears 4:1, and the agency still has not resolved what the FCC Covered List means for the parts these American teams built with.

Haye KestelooAug 4

Cleanup

DJI FlyCart Cleans Everest. We Are Why It Has To

A DJI FlyCart 100 spent the 2026 Everest season hauling more than 22,000 pounds of oxygen, rope, ladders and trash across the Khumbu Icefall, cutting a deadly six-to-eight-hour Sherpa trek to an eight-minute drone flight.

Rafael SuárezJul 16

Heavy Lift Drones

Korean Drug Lord's Drone Jailbreak Undone by a Viral Test Flight

DARPA Runner-Up MTech Missed 4:1 By One Overheating Motor

DARPA Doubles Lift Challenge Payload After 5 Of 76 Teams Scored

DARPA Pays Half As A Conventional Helicopter Wins The Lift Challenge At 3.84:1

DARPA Lift Challenge Opens In Dayton With A Prize Rule That Plans For Failure

DJI FlyCart Cleans Everest. We Are Why It Has To

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