Amazon to Make Deliveries by Drone in California Later This Year

Amazon.com Inc.'s long-planned drone-delivery service will make its U.S. debut this year, joining other companies like Walmart Inc. and Alphabet Inc. that have begun shipping goods using unmanned aircraft.

The e-commerce giant said Monday its drone-delivery program will make its first deliveries to Lockeford, Calif., located in San Joaquin County about 100 miles northeast of San Francisco. Lockeford is a rural community with a population of about 11,700, according to Census figures.

Amazon said it developed a sense and detection system for the drones so the devices can avoid midair collisions and hitting things on the ground. The company didn't specify exactly when deliveries would begin.

"If obstacles are identified, our drone will automatically change course to safely avoid them," Amazon said in a press release. "As our drone descends to deliver the package into a customer's backyard, the drone ensures that there's a small area around the delivery location that's clear of any people, animals, or other obstacles."

Amazon declined to comment further.

Amazon shares fell 5% Monday afternoon amid a broad market selloff.

The announcement of Amazon's first U.S. drone delivery comes as other companies are ramping up their drone-delivery capabilities.

Walmart Inc. said last month it was expanding drone-delivery service to Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Texas, Utah and Virginia. Operator DroneUp LLC began managing drone-delivery hubs out of Walmart stores in Arkansas in November.

Wing, a unit of Google parent Alphabet, said in April it was rolling out drone-delivery service in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Wing also operates drone deliveries in Christiansburg, Va., Finland and Australia.

It has been nearly a decade since Amazon first said it planned to use drones to make deliveries. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos said in 2013 it was possible the company could start the program in four or five years in the U.S.

Amazon would make its first drone delivery in 2016 in a rural part of England near Cambridge, U.K. Rural areas pose challenges for retailers like Amazon because it is costly and inefficient to deliver packages to areas that are spread out. Drone delivery could help retailers make shipments to rural areas more efficiently, and the wide open spaces makes it a desirable location to test the drones.

The Federal Aviation Administration in 2020 gave Amazon approval to set up a fleet of drones to begin limited tests of package deliveries to customers in the U.S.