Beyond visual line of sight package delivery has been promoted
as the "holy grail" of UAS technology. Major players
have devoted enormous amounts of time and effort into creating the
missing technological pieces. At the same time, armies of
lobbyists have been deployed to try to get the Congress to speed
up, or in some cases, completely circumvent, the FAA and its time
consuming, methodical rulemaking process.
Based on all of this work, it was surprising to hear that the
United States Postal Service Office of Inspector General is taking
a hard look at the entire premise. The following paragraph was
slipped into the middle of a lengthy "Fact Sheet," issued
by the White House earlier this month, entitled "
New Commitments to Accelerate the Safe Integration of Unmanned
Aircraft Systems:"
