Skip to main content

Boeing’s beast of a drone can carry up to 500 pounds of cargo

Future of autonomous air travel: Boeing unveils new cargo air vehicle prototype
Perhaps the only surprising thing about Boeing’s remotely controlled octocopter is that it’s taken it this long to make one.

The aerospace company unveiled this meaty flying machine on January 10 and claims it has the potential to transform the way we carry heavy payloads over relatively short distances.

Recommended Videos

Described by Boeing as an “unmanned electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing (eVTOL) cargo air vehicle (CAV) prototype,” the octocopter took just three months to build and measures 4.57 meters by 5.49 meters. It weighs more than 700 pounds and can carry payloads of up to 500 pounds. To give that a bit of context, the much, much smaller Phantom 4 consumer drone made by DJI can hardly manage 2 pounds. Yes, Boeing’s creation is a beast.

The company’s chief technology officer, Greg Hyslop, said the new air vehicle represents “another major step in our Boeing eVTOL strategy,” adding, “We have an opportunity to really change air travel and transport, and we’ll look back on this day as a major step in that journey.”

A short video (above) posted by Boeing this week shows the hefty machine lifted into the air by its eight counter-rotating sets of blades. But the enormous scale of the design is only apparent in the few brief shots in which you can see some of the team standing right by it.

“It’s fully electric on some Boeing custom-designed batteries,” says David Neely of Boeing Research and Technology. “The goal is to extend into a large-scale cargo platform; if you extend the range and extend the payload a little bit [we can] deliver 250 to 500 pounds over a 10 or 20 mile radius [and] change the way we deliver goods.”

The unveiling comes just months after Boeing acquired Aurora Flight Sciences, a world-class developer and manufacturer of advanced automated drones and aerospace platforms. Hyslop said at the time that the two companies would work together to “advance the development of autonomy for our commercial and military systems [and] open new markets with transformational technologies.”

One thing springs to mind with Boeing’s beast. If Amazon gets wind of the technology, it may be keen to incorporate it into its own Prime Air drone, paving the way for flying televisions and other heavy goods for delivery to customers.

But of course, for drone delivery platforms of all shapes and sizes, strict regulatory hurdles still need to be overcome before they can go into operation.

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
The UK’s Wayve brings its AI automated driving software to U.S. shores
wayve ai automated driving us driver assist2 1920x1152 1

It might seem that the autonomous driving trend is moving at full speed and on its own accord, especially if you live in California.Wayve, a UK startup that has received over $1 billion in funding, is now joining the crowded party by launching on-road testing of its AI learning system on the streets of San Francisco and the Bay Area.The announcement comes just weeks after Tesla unveiled its Robotaxi at the Warner Bros Studios in Burbank, California. It was also in San Francisco that an accident last year forced General Motors’ robotaxi service Cruise to stop its operations. And it’s mostly in California that Waymo, the only functioning robotaxi service in the U.S., first deployed its fleet of self-driving cars. As part of its move, Wayve opened a new office in Silicon Valley to support its U.S. expansion and AI development. Similarly to Tesla’s Full-Self Driving (FSD) software, the company says it’s using AI to provide automakers with a full range of driver assistance and automation features.“We are now testing our AI software in real-world environments across two continents,” said Alex Kendall, Wayve co-founder and CEO.The company has already conducted tests on UK roads since 2018. It received a huge boost earlier this year when it raised over $1 billion in a move led by Softbank and joined by Microsoft and Nvidia. In August, Uber also said it would invest to help the development of Wayve’s technology.Just like Tesla’s FSD, Wayve’s software provides an advanced driver assistance system that still requires driver supervision.Before driverless vehicles can legally hit the road, they must first pass strict safety tests.So far, Waymo’s technology, which relies on pre-mapped roads, sensors, cameras, radar, and lidar (a laser-light radar), is the only of its kind to have received the nod from U.S. regulators.

Read more
Aptera’s 3-wheel solar EV hits milestone on way toward 2025 commercialization
Aptera 2e

EV drivers may relish that charging networks are climbing over each other to provide needed juice alongside roads and highways.

But they may relish even more not having to make many recharging stops along the way as their EV soaks up the bountiful energy coming straight from the sun.

Read more
Ford ships new NACS adapters to EV customers
Ford EVs at a Tesla Supercharger station.

Thanks to a Tesla-provided adapter, owners of Ford electric vehicles were among the first non-Tesla drivers to get access to the SuperCharger network in the U.S.

Yet, amid slowing supply from Tesla, Ford is now turning to Lectron, an EV accessories supplier, to provide these North American Charging Standard (NACS) adapters, according to InsideEVs.

Read more