Drone News Roundup: Video Shows How Drone Taxis Could Change the Future of Travel, Porsche Releases High Octane FPV Drone Video, and More!

This week we’re covering a slick new video from drone taxi maker Archer, which has a futuristic depiction of what the world might look like when you can fly to work instead of driving there.

We’re also covering an impressive FPV drone video from Porsche made to launch a new car, a cute drone video of elephants napping, a drone light show Greenpeace put on at the G7 summit to bring attention to the environment, and the formation of a new FAA committee to investigate how to make BVLOS operations routine for drone pilots in the U.S.

Now on to the links!

Drone Taxi Company Archer Shows Off Possibilities of Its Tech in New Video

A new promotional video from Archer displays what a future in which taxi drones are a reality might look like. The video is largely aspirational, with sweeping statements about how drone taxis will finally free humans from the constraints of gravity, but it has some exciting animation showing what urban air mobility might look like if it hits the mainstream. We especially like the depiction of the vertiports in the desert toward the end—very scifi. According to a recent presentation, Archer’s taxi drones could be helpful in places where the traffic is overly congested, such as Los Angeles, giving people a way to quickly go from one place to another at a cost of $4 per mile—without having to wait in traffic.

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Porsche Releases High Octane FPV Drone Video to Launch New Car

Porsche has been releasing some amazing content lately made with and by drones. Last week we covered a series of drone light paintings the company did recently with photographer and artist Baber Afzal, and this week we’re covering a high octane FPV video shot by Johnny FPV to promote Porsche’s new Taycan Cross Turismo. The video spans locations, from the snowy woods of Finland to the deserts of the United Arab Emirates, seamlessly blending one spot into the other. You don’t have to be a fan of sports cars to enjoy the impressive aerial cinematography, trick flying, and exotic locations featured in this video.

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Drone Video Shows Elephants Napping on Long Migration Across China

It’s not just that the elephants were caught napping during the day in this drone video, which would be enough to make us watch all on its own. It’s also that a restless baby elephant is taking its snooze between three adults, all of whom seem happy to let the baby roll around and lay on them as it struggles to get to sleep. If you need a moment of Zen today, this video shot in southwest China could certainly fit the bill.

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Greenpeace Uses Drones to Send a Message at the G7 summit

Greenpeace put on a drone show with 300 light show drones recently at the G7 summit, which took place in Cornwall, U.K., and included world leaders such as U.S. President Joe Biden and the U.K.’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson, among others. The light show included several different huge animals formed in 3D, including a butterfly, a whale, a turtle, and a bee, all of which appear to move across the night sky in dynamic animation. The message of the light show was clear for those attending the summit: ACT NOW. These words were the closing image of the light show, and were meant as a rallying cry to the world’s leaders at the G7 to take action against climate change and stop the impending extinction of so many of the planet’s endangered species.

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FAA Creates Committee to Study Rules for Routine BVLOS Operations

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FAA Administrator Steve Dickson recently announced that the FAA has created a new rulemaking committee to develop a regulatory path for enabling routine BVLOS (Beyond Visual Line of Sight) drone operations. The FAA has been pushing to normalize BVLOS drone operations lately, with its new BEYOND program—which began when the UAS IPP ended—explicitly focused on BVLOS, and its work with North Dakota to help create a statewide BVLOS network there.

The announcement about the new committee was made at the FAA UAS Symposium, which took place on June 9 and 10. Iris Automation will be an FAA partner on the committee, and more partners may be made public soon. According to the announcement, the committee will submit its recommendations for new rules to enable BVLOS drone operations within six months.

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