The present invention provides a fruit harvesting, dilution and/or pruning system comprising: (a) a computerized system for mapping an orchard or a map of trees position and their contour in a plantation; (b) a management system for autonomous unmanned aircraft vehicle (UAV) fleet management for harvesting, diluting or pruning fruits; and a method for UAV autonomous harvesting, dilution and/or pruning of an orchard.

Described herein are methods and systems for picking up, transporting, and lowering a payload coupled to a tether of a winch system arranged on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). For example, the winch system may include a motor for winding and unwinding the tether from a spool, and the UAV's control system may operate the motor to lower the tether toward the ground so a payload may be attached to the tether. The control system may monitor an electric current supplied to the motor to determine whether the payload has been attached to the tether. In another example, when lowering a payload, the control system may monitor the motor current to determine that the payload has reached the ground and responsively operate the motor to detach the payload from the tether. The control system may then monitor the motor current to determine whether the payload has detached from the tether.

An unmanned aerial vehicle, including: a propelling device configured to generate a downward airstream; a package carrier; and wheels arranged so as to allow the package carrier to stand alone. The package carrier includes: vertical members which surround a package in a horizontal direction to prevent falling of the package; support members configured to support a load of the package at positions; and a coupling device configured to hold vertical members so as to enable relative horizontal movement. The support members are each fixed to a corresponding one of the vertical members. The wheels are each mounted to the corresponding one of the vertical members, and enable the relative horizontal movement of the vertical members under a state in which the wheels are on the ground. Through the relative horizontal movement of the vertical members, the package is separable from the support members.

An aircraft that can fly stably when water is discharged from a hose installed on the airframe, and an aircraft system, are provided. The aircraft system can include a master aircraft, slave aircrafts and a remote control device. The aircraft preferably fly as a unit. Each slave aircraft can include four rotary blade portions having propellers, and a suspending means for suspending a part of a hose. The master aircraft may include four first rotary blade portions having first propellers arranged to rotate in a horizontal plane, four second rotary blade portions having second propellers arranged to rotate in a vertical plane, and a nozzle on which a tip end part of the hose is installed. The direction of the center axis of the nozzle is parallel to the direction of the rotational axes of the second propellers.

Embodiments of a payload delivery and drop device for an unmanned aerial vehicle, and method of its use are described herein. In some embodiments, an apparatus includes a moveable collar defining a lumen having a centerline, and a rigid bar that has a first portion and a second portion different from the first portion. The first portion of the rigid bar has a centerline and the second portion of the rigid bar has a centerline different from the centerline of the first portion. The second portion of the rigid bar is disposed within the lumen of the collar when the rigid bar is in a first position. The centerline of the first portion of the rigid bar is substantially non-parallel to the centerline of the lumen of the moveable collar when the rigid bar is in the first position. The centerline of the second portion of the rigid bar is substantially non-parallel to the centerline of the lumen when the rigid bar is in the second position.

The present disclosure provides generally for a system and method for planting flora, fauna, and dispersing various organisms through drone delivery. The system may comprise of a drone with seedling box that may hold and drop the pods containing flora or fauna. The seedling box may hold the pods with the flora or fauna in them and at specific intervals drop the pod with the flora or fauna. The seedling box may also hold various organisms or other materials and drop these organisms or materials when directed. A seedling box may comprise loading mechanism and deploying mechanism to facilitate accurate, timely deployment of the pods containing the seedlings. A pod may comprise a weighted tip with hollow cavity for seedling placement and a vertical rod for securing seedling during deployment. Where the system comprises uneven number of seedlings, seedling box may include counterweights to provide stability in configured flight patterns for duration of seedling deployment.

A method for loading one of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) and a container for the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle with one or more items is disclosed. The method includes determining a Center of Gravity (COG) of the one or more items. The method also includes loading the one of the UAV and the container for the UAV with the one or more items based on the COG of the one or more items. The method further includes positioning one or more weights relative to the one or more items and relative to the one of the UAV and the container for the UAV such that a combined COG of the one or more items, the one of the UAV and the container for the UAV, and the one or more weights is positioned within a predetermined region relative to the one of the UAV and the container for the UAV.

A method for loading an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle with one or more items is disclosed. The method includes positioning one or more items in specific positions within one of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle and a container configured to be carried by the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle based on a Center of Gravity of each of the one or more items. The method also includes securing the one or more items in the specific positions within the one of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle and the container to prevent the one or more items from shifting and changing a combined Center of Gravity of the one or more items combined with the one of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle and the container during a flight of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle.

This disclosure describes an unmanned aerial vehicle (“UAV”) configured to autonomously deliver items of inventory to various destinations. The UAV may receive inventory information and a destination location and autonomously retrieve the inventory from a location within a materials handling facility, compute a route from the materials handling facility to a destination and travel to the destination to deliver the inventory.

Presented herein are systems, methods and apparatuses for increasing reliability of face recognition in analysis of images captured by drone mounted imaging sensors, comprising: recognizing a target person in one or more iterations, each iteration comprising: identifying one or more positioning properties of the target person based on analysis of image(s) captured by imaging sensor(s) mounted on a drone operated to approach the target person, instructing the drone to adjust its position to an optimal facial image capturing position selected based on the positioning property(s), receiving facial image(s) of the target person captured by the imaging sensor(s), receiving a face classification associated with a probability score from machine learning model(s) trained to recognize the target person, and initiating another iteration in case the probability score does not exceed a certain threshold. Finally, the face classification may be outputted for use by one or more face recognition based systems.