Hessian cargo drones are to provide US Americans with urgently needed medical goods in the future.

The American aviation company Air Methods and the start-up Wingcopter from Weiterstadt near Darmstadt have announced this project.

Air Methods is planning a network to supply hospitals and communities in predominantly rural areas, among other things, with blood products, drugs, diagnostics or small medical devices.

The company, which is represented in 48 states at around 300 locations, wants to set up a subsidiary called Spright for this purpose. 

Falk Heunemann

Business editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.

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Freight drones are to be used for the deliveries.

For this, Air Method will acquire drones from the Hessian manufacturer Wingcopter, it said.

The plan is to use the new Wingcopter 178 model, which the start-up only presented in April.

The high-flyer with electric drive can transport up to three parcels and a maximum of six kilograms over 75 kilometers, with lower loads a greater range is possible.

The maximum speed is 145 kilometers per hour.

Pilot test in Kansas

Air Methods has a fleet of around 450 helicopters and airplanes in the United States and carries out around 70,000 transports for hospitals and other healthcare facilities annually. This makes the company, with 4,500 employees, one of the largest providers in the industry. It already has a license to operate long-distance commercial drone flights. "We are thrilled to be building this life-saving delivery drone network in the USA together with Air Methods," says Tom Plümmer, co-founder and head of Wingcopter. The start-up has moved into a former e-bike factory in the southern Hessian town of Weiterstadt to produce the new cargo drones How many drones Air Methods ordered was not disclosed.

A pilot test is initially planned in the US state of Kansas in the fall. The project should show how Spright and Wingcopter could provide the necessary medical supply security in rural America, said the start-up. Further details are not yet announced.

Wingcopter had only received a cash injection of 22 million dollars from several investors in the spring, including Xplorer Capital from Silicon Valley and the Futury Regio Growth Fund, in which the state of Hesse and several Hessian companies are involved. "Our technology has already been used successfully around the world to effectively deliver medical goods, such as insulin in Ireland, children's vaccines in Vanuatu, emergency medication in Malawi and, more recently, blood samples in Germany," said Plümmer. The pharmaceutical company Merck uses them for deliveries between the Darmstadt headquarters and a branch. The parcel delivery service UPS has also agreed to cooperate with the Hessian manufacturer.