Package Delivery Experiments with a Camera Drone

The undergoing efforts for the integration of robotics into logistics systems is affecting the production workflow at all stages, from the transportation and the handling of parts inside storage and production facilities to the final product distribution. In this paper we address the problem of delivering a package by means of a multirotor drone. We describe a fully autonomous package delivery flight demonstration prepared in collaboration with an industrial partner. All computations are performed in real-time on-board the drone. A gimbal camera is utilized to realize the vision-based localization, by means of fiducial markers, of the delivery position and the landing platform on a pickup truck. The demonstration consists of the fully autonomous execution of the following tasks: the drone takes-off from the truck, looks for the delivery position, proceeds to land and drop the package, flies back to the distribution truck and follows it, and the flight is finished by performing the landing on the static vehicle. The experiments focus on the performance of the vision-based truck following.