Burrito Bomber Will Drone Drop Deliciousness on Your Head in 2015

Remember the TacoCopter? The startup was going to use your phone's GPS to deliver tacos via drone directly to your doorstep. The Internet (and the staff of Reason) got pretty excited, but the company turned out to be little more than a pie-in-the-sky idea—stalled in concept phase by unfriendly regulators. 

But it's time to get your hopes up again, Internet! Meet the Burrito Bomber:

Here's the self-description provided by the folks at Darwin Aerospace:

It works like this:

• You connect to the Burrito Bomber web-app and order a burrito. Your smartphone sends your current location to our server, which generates a waypoint file compatible with the drone's autopilot.
• We upload the waypoint file to the drone and load your burrito in to our custom made Burrito Delivery Tube.
• The drone flies to your location and releases the Burrito Delivery Tube. The burrito parachutes down to you, the drone flies itself home, and you enjoy your carne asada.

For now, the aircraft you see in the video is the only one of it's kind, since unmanned aerial vehicles like this one are not cleared for commercial use. But now there is hope on the horizon for food delivery drones of all nationalities. As the legal scholars at the Burrito Bomber website explain:

The FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 requires the FAA to hammer out regulations for commercial use drones by September 2015. This means in 2015 we'll be able to take to the skies to bring you your burrito faster than you can say "¡Salsa roja por favor!".

Drones: not all sadness and death!

Via BoingBoing, obviously.

Comments

[sarcasmic]

alt-text missing a "huh good god y'all"

[Sevo]

In a year or so, Gore will be claiming to have invented the B-B, while lefties in general will be claiming this couldn't have happened without the government.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Way too fuckin' geek-twee for my tastes.

[Citizen Nothing]

They said the same thing about Gutenberg.

[Heroic Mulatto]

.

[Heroic Mulatto]

There is nothing twee here.

[widget]

drones, what are they good for?

The USG's consumer-grade GPS (and you payed for this) is accurate to within 15 meters. I'm not so keen on setting up a ladder to get my burrito off of my garage roof.

[Zeb]

And that is not even taking into account the wind, which I imagine will have a significant effect on the parachute.

[Dr. Frankenstein]

alt alt-text

As God is my witness I thought turkeys could fly.

[Rasilio]

Ok seriously a Burrito bomber?

Who the hell wants food delivered by unmanned drones, you get fucked bad enough at the drive through as it is, I can just imagine how shitty the service is with no human involved in the system.

Now if these yokels really want to get serious about drone delivery services why not make it something prepackaged and useful like Beer or condoms?

[fried wylie]

I can just imagine how shitty the service is with no human involved in the system.

I would come to the opposite conclusion. Who do you think is shitting up the service?

[Sevo]

"Who do you think is shitting up the service?"

Why, it's a computer error.
(which means two human fuck-ups; the guy who entered the data and the guy lying to you)

[Tonio]

Well, KM-W has a poor track record on this sort of thing. She famously bought into the Belgian BBQ Tax (April Fool's Hoax) a few years back. Personally, if I was going to troll the media to see how gullible they were KM-W and "Reason" would be my first go-to.

[widget]

There are Belgians who want to tax your internet service. This is a hoax. Right?

[Brett L]

I am building one of these. Fuckit.

[Brett L]

My housemate is into r/c planes. I sent him this video and have received about a google chat message a minute for 30 minutes as he geeks out over pricing components and watching the video. I suspect I may be storing something analogous in the next month or so.

[widget]

I oppose civilians using RC aircraft equipped with paint guns to knock out municipal surveillance cameras. That would be evil.

[fried wylie]

our custom made Burrito Delivery Tube

Jetpacks and Flying cars can go fuck themselves.

The Future Is Truly Here.

[ant1sthenes]

Already planning to use drones to gas civilian populations? Tragic.

[ConHugeCo]

Win

[mr simple]

Drones: not all sadness and death!

Might want to wait until after you've tried the burritos before you declare this.

[Brandon]

I'm hoping Chipotle will buy the concept.

[Stormy Dragon]

And then came the horrible mistake where a missile drone and a burrito drone got mixed up during shipping, resulting in a horrible day for both Burrito Bomber and the DOD.

[fried wylie]

Actually, it worked out for the DOD since the burrito inflicted far fewer civilian casualties than the intended bomb would have.

[Tim]

If Hitler had these, he would have won Stalingrad.

[fried wylie]

wouldn't the Borscht Bomber be more appropriate?

[fried wylie]

"The snows of Stalingrad ran purple that day, many a belly was filled to bursting with liquid warmth, and the only resistance to taking the city was the threat of tripping over the soundly napping forms of the opposition forces."

[Tablet pc]

I have no idea about this post.

[Tablet pc]

This analogy is so funny