The Economic Profit and Loss of the Drones Industry

“A drone capable of delivering a package to your door will also be capable of delivering a small bomb.” This is a rather startling and shocking quotation and encourages us to think about the pros and cons of using drones on a regular basis. Should drones be able to be used by anyone without any restrictions? Should the public have free, and easy, access to them? Drones are becoming a big issue in the modern world, almost as serious as the gun laws. Drones are developing rapidly and now are capable of flying for long periods of time with high quality cameras and are capable of carrying large amounts. In this instance, one may argue that there are many positive effects of having drones.

Anyone has access in the UK, there isn’t an age restriction, nobody cares to ask what you intend on doing with the drone or where you might do it. Safety is a huge issue because of the ease of access. For example, It is incredibly simple to avoid a giant and loud object, you don’t need to be intelligent to know to get out of the way of something large moving quickly, a caveman could do it it’s that simple. But surprisingly there is still issues. If there is still people getting near misses with aeroplanes, it really makes you question their knowledge. Flying anywhere has a list of things that could happen, What if my drone runs out of battery and falls? What if I crash and cause damage? If somebody is not capable and confident to fly in an open space without aeroplanes nearby, then why are they even attempting to fly nearby an airport? There is no doubt that a large drone hitting an aeroplane could easily cause a crash, killing many people. So considering that literally anyone can buy a drone, should you have to apply for a license or get lessons before you take your drone where lives are in danger?

Drones really are changing the world, they can now do pretty much anything from saving lives to delivering pizza. Drones are now being used by emergency services and already they are proving to be extremely effective. For search and rescue teams using drones to find injured people is reducing costs drastically. A single helicopter flight is said to cost around £850 per hour whereas the use of drones is free, the only thing that money would have to be spent on is the actual drone and maintenance. Drones can be used in many treacherous weather types unlike helicopters, and put nobodies life at risk. Drones also come in various sizes, this is good as if someone has fallen into a hole or crevasse, there will most likely be a drone that will be able to reach this person. The use of drones for the police and military is also another example of drones being used by emergency services. The French Police have used drones in the past for the surveillance of large events. At the Euro 2016 football tournament, especially at the time of the terrorism risks, their solution was to use two drones to procure information. Two drones flew around the stadium at speeds of up to 22 miles per hour, use thermal imaging cameras and are capable of reading car registration plates from 50m away at an altitude of 30m.

Similar to most revolutionary technology nowadays, it ends up being used for something completely unintended. Commercial drones were designed and were intended to be bought so that people could reach areas impossible to access otherwise for live and still photography. Unfortunately the reported crimes involving drones is increasing quickly. One issue found in the USA is the use of drones for drug smuggling, which is becoming an ever-growing issue. One drone that crashed trying to fly over the USA border from Mexico was carrying six pounds of the drug crystal meth, which is valued at around 48,000 dollars. The drone was also not remotely controlled and used an automatic GPS system to get to its location, this mean that the mysterious drone is almost completely untraceable. The police forces and border control are fully aware of this drug smuggling occurring but there really isn’t much they can do to prevent it. They can’t constantly keep an eye on every single part of the border where there could be a drone flying hundreds of metres in the air or flying hundreds of metres out at sea. Even if they somehow managed to catch a drone, what can they do when it’s virtually untraceable?

The economic implication of drones is undeniable. Over the span of 10 years between 2015 and 2025, commercial drones are said to have generated 82.1 billion dollars in job creation and economic growth and generate around 100,000 jobs. Consumer companies more recently have explored the use of drones for commercial purposes such as delivering packages. Amazon has thought of a way to bring prime members packages within 30 minutes, which shows how quickly the use of drones is developing and how many benefits there, are of using them. Google, in altruistic contrast, have created a system which can easily deliver medicine to people in remote places, this allows for medicine to be accessed at a much faster rate and could also be the difference between life and death. It is very clear from these two implications that the use of drones has a very positive impact for the public and as technology improves the usage of drones can only be improved and developed.

It is very challenging to decide whether the usage of drones has enough benefits to outweigh the increasing amount of negatives. Although commercial drones has already made vast improvements to many services in the world and will continue to, the negatives will always catch up and with drones, there is nothing we can do to stop this. Drones are a very new technology and nowadays most pioneering technology is abused, given time I think that firm laws will be placed on who and where drones can be used slowing the increase of the negative usages of commercial drones. This for me is enough to make me believe that in time, drones will create a huge positive impact on how the world operates and change many peoples lives.