Star Simpson, the MIT grad who started the Tacocopter site/stunt, has been living in Hong Kong and she's decided to build on the media attention by actually working on a copter. As the Huffington Report puts it:
Well, the flight was more symbolic than anything, proof to the doubters that a small drone copter could indeed be rigged to handle the weight of a taco and the mission of taco delivery. As Simpson told HuffPost in March, Tacocopter is more of a concept than a concrete startup at this point, more a conversation starter about the future of delivery services than a realistic plan.
(Frankly, if we're getting pessimistic about Tacocopter's maiden flight, I'm more concerned with the taco itself: I like my tacos substantially -- substantially! -- larger than the one shown in the video. We want a tacocopter, not a taquitocopter).
So, no, Tacocopter isn't quite ready to scale up into a true company that mass delivers Mexican food via drone. It still has to learn to deal with an intimidating set of technical issues -- GPS mastery, mass production of drones, wind, heavy rain, birds, building ledges, telephone wires, thieves etc. -- before you can even think about actually receiving your taco via aerial flavor strike.
Here's the first flight:
Comments
Ay caramba! That's a lot of tacos. TacoCopter has some competition.
How how many TDOPS (Taco Delivery Ops Per Sec) can UberTaco deliver?
I'm getting hungry waiting for that taco that was supposed to be delivered via TacoCopter. Not sure if I can hold on for much longer, so I'll bid farewell to all. ;-)
I am still hopeful that taco delivery is the killer app for drone technology. By that I mean a shell with meat, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and salsa not Tactical Aeriel Combat Ordnance.