Drones deliver 38 tonnes of equipment offshore for Orsted

Drone manufacturer FlyingBasket and drone logistics operator Skylift are working together to execute the first large-scale, offshore drone delivery project in the United Kingdom. Skylift used two FlyingBasket FB3 heavy-lift cargo drones to deliver 38.1 tonnes of equipment over six and a half weeks to more than 400 wind turbines owned and operated by offshore energy producer Orsted, Skylift told Cargo Facts . [caption id="attachment_57291415" align="aligncenter" width="2560"] The FlyingBasket FB3s flew to the turbines from ships. (Courtesy/Skylift)[/caption] Offshore lift capabilities The FB3 heavy-lift drones, each with a 100 kg payload, operated more than 600 flights from cargo ships to wind turbines at the Hornsea 1 and 2 wind farms off the east coast of England and the Walney 1 and 2 wind farms in the Irish Sea, representing the largest offshore wind drone delivery program to date, according to a Sept. 2 Skylift release. The wind turbines were as far as seventy-five miles offshore. The FlyingBasket drone operates on four lithium-ion batteries and has a maximum range of 1.5 miles with a speed of sixty-seven miles per hour. Their use decreased equipment delivery time in the drop zone from fifty minutes to one minute, Skylift said. Drone support is cheaper and greener compared with the traditional methods of delivering equipment, and improves operational efficiency and safety, according to Skylift. First European drone ops Skylift is seeing use cases for its drone logistics ops across multiple industries, it told Cargo Facts , without providing details. Italy-based Flying Basket debuted the FB3 heavy-lift drone in Europe in August 2024, delivering nearly 5.5 tonnes of cargo to Orsted’s Borssele 1 and 2 wind farms off the coast of the Netherlands. The drone developer had previously collaborated with Post Italiane and Italian government contractor Leonardo in 2024 to dispatch the FB3 drone to the Gulf of Naples and support an experiment in the Minor Islands, among other cargo deliveries. Register here for Cargo Facts ’ upcoming free webinar, “Air cargo route networks: Strategies for improved results and greater efficiencies,” on Tuesday, Sept. 16, at 11 a.m. ET. Cargo Facts Symposium, the quintessential event for stakeholders and key leaders in the global freighter and air cargo industries, will take place Oct. 22-24 at the Grand Hyatt in Nashville . Learn more and register today to take advantage of the early-bird rate before Sept. 5.

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