Marking a first in U.S. aviation history, the Federal Aviation Administration has authorized Wing Aviation and Zipline International to fly commercial drones in the same Dallas-area airspace without visual observers. 

In typical operations, a drone pilot must be able to see the aircraft at all times, the FAA said in a blog posted on Medium. But beginning in early 2023, Wing and ZIpline began testing a new system called UAS traffic management technology, or UTM (UAS is short for unmanned aircraft systems.) The testing was initially done via simulations.

UTM leverages new advancements in air traffic technology and procedures that the FAA says could one day make Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) flights “routine.”

The FAA authorizations will allow Wing and Zipline to deliver packages in the Dallas area while keeping their drones safely separated using the UTM system—managing the airspace themselves with “rigorous FAA safety oversight.”

“This is the first time the FAA has recognized a third-party to safely manage drone-to-drone interactions,” Praveen Raju, a program manager in the FAA’s NextGen Office, said in the blog post. “As always, safety comes first, and we required exhaustive research and testing before giving the green light.”

Years of drone deliveries in Dallas-Fort Worth

Zipline’s delivery drone lowers this small “droid” to the ground on a tether, where it gently deposits the customer’s package before being retrieved skyward. [Image: Walmart]

Dallas Innovates has been following the rise of drone deliveries in North Texas for years.

A lot of initial testing happened at Hillwood’s AllianceTexas Flight Test Center in Fort Worth in what’s known as the Mobility Innovation Zone (The MIZ), where advanced testing continues to this day.

In October 2021, Wing Aviation—Alphabet’s drone delivery sister company—launched a first-of-its-kind commercial drone service in a major U.S. metro out of Frisco Station north of Dallas. That same month, Wing began making on-demand deliveries from Walgreens drug stores in Little Elm and Frisco.

A Wing drone delivery is prepared by a Walgreens employee in North Texas in 2021. [Image: Wing/Walgreens]

In March 2022, Israel-based Flytrex began delivering chicken wings by drone from a Chili’s restaurant in Granbury in a partnership with Dallas-based Brinker International. In flights that averaged 3 minutes 30 seconds, wings zoom over Lake Granbury, pause above their destination, and are lowered to the ground in a bright yellow bag, while the drone hovers 80 feet above.

In December 2022, Walmart began drone deliveries from 11 Dallas-area stores via a partnership with the company DroneUp. The drone hubs included Dallas, Garland, Mesquite, Murphy, Plano, Richardson, Rowlett, and The Colony.

In August 2023, Walmart said it was partnering with Wing to expand its drone delivery service in Dallas-Fort Worth by adding services to two area superstores.

In October 2023, Ireland-based Manna Drone Delivery kicked off its U.S. commercial operations from The Miz in Fort Worth, with drones that fly at 60 miles per hour at a height of around 200 feet. The first deliveries were food, beverages, and Halloween candy to residents of Hillwood’s Pecan Square development north of The Miz.

Walmart’s Wing and Zipline drone deliveries now reach ‘up to 75%’ of DFW residents

[Image: Walmart]

Walmart’s drone operations expanded sharply this past January, when its “airborne delivery footprint” grew to offer Wing and Zipline drone deliveries for “up to 75% of Dallas-Fort Worth residents.”

“Drone delivery is not just a concept of the future, it’s happening now, and will soon be a reality for millions of additional Texans,” Prathibha Rajashekhar, SVP of innovation and automation for Walmart U.S., said in January.

Wing and Zipline to monitor delivery flights using UTM beginning this month

The FAA said that when Wing and Zipline first began testing live flights with the UTM system, they operated in separated airspace. After the companies had safely performed “thousands of flights,” the FAA issued the authorizations enabling flights in shared airspace.

All flights are kept below 400 feet in altitude and away from any crewed aircraft, the FAA noted. The agency said it expects initial flights using UTM services will begin this month and that additional authorizations in the Dallas area are expected to be issued “in the near future.”

Jarrett Larrow, regulatory and policy lead at the FAA’s UAS Integration Office, said the industry “is providing us with a lot of detailed documentation and we’re providing a lot of oversight.”

“These public-private partnerships are key to safely integrating drones into our National Airspace System,” Larrow added in the blog post.

Aiming to achieve ‘global drone harmonization’

The Wing and Zipline operations in the Dallas area could be a harbinger for how drone deliveries eventually work across the nation.

The newly authorized operations “will inform FAA efforts to authorize additional UTM services, including improved situational awareness and enhanced cybersecurity,” the agency said, adding that they will assist the FAA in developing UTM rules “that allow wide-scale BVLOS drone operations without special authorizations.”

The eyes of companies and organizations around the world, including the Global UTM Association, have been fixated on the North Texas UTM testing, the FAA noted, and are expected to send delegations to the U.S. while seeking advice from the FAA for their own UTM systems.

“We’re continuing to lead global drone harmonization,” the FAA’s Raju said in the blog post.

Above all, the goal of UTM is safety—while making sure companies have an equal shot at using lower airspace for their drone operations.

“UTM is a critical piece for safe, routine, scalable BVLOS operations and to ensure everyone has equitable access to the airspace,” Larrow said in the post. “If service providers and operators are successful in cooperatively sharing the airspace using UTM, it will be a repeatable process nationwide.”

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