The city of Reno, Nevada has announced that Flirtey—one of its partners in the UAS Integration Pilot Program (IPP)—has received approval from the FAA to conduct beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) UAS delivery flights.

With the approval, Flirtey will be able to conduct UAS delivery operations with a pilot controlling the flights from a remote location.

“Flirtey’s industry-leading technology is now approved for drone delivery beyond visual line of sight, a major milestone that brings life-saving and commercial drone delivery another step closer to your doorstep,” says Flirtey Founder and CEO Matthew Sweeny.

Flirtey has received the BVLOS approval with its next-generation UAS, which was specially designed to carry heavier payloads for longer distances. With the capabilities of its UAS, Flirtey will be able to deliver Automated External Defibrillators (AEDs) and commercial packages.

One of ten participants in the UAS IPP, the city of Reno chose Flirtey as its partner to deliver AEDs for the immediate treatment of a person experiencing cardiac arrest, which is the leading cause of natural death in the United States. For every minute that a person experiencing cardiac arrest waits to receive defibrillation, their odds of survival decrease by about 10 percent.

Using UAS to deploy AEDs, though, the average cardiac arrest survival rate can increase from 10 percent to approximately 47 percent, the entities note.

The entities add that based on historical data, just one Flirtey delivery drone carrying an AED has the potential to save at least one life every two weeks in Reno. If deployed across the U.S., Flirtey's AED drone delivery service has the potential to save more than 100,000 lives per year and more than one million American lives over each decade to come.

“The City of Reno is proud to partner with Flirtey, the FAA, and our local IPP partners to enable drone delivery of AEDs to Washoe County residents,” says City of Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve.

“Public safety is our top priority, and the use of drones to provide life-saving AED technology to cardiac patients will save lives across our community.”