The Future of Drones

Drones, unmanned aerial vehicles, have been put to use by various military bodies around the world as silent harbingers of death and destruction. But they might also be put to use for good causes: deployed in rescue operations, for example, or accurately dropping seeds to aid reforestation.

Realistically, will they ever be used to deliver your mail? And can the danger from drones that fail and drop out of the sky ever be nullified?

Click assembles a panel of experts to discuss the future of drones. Joining Gareth Mitchell and Bill Thompson in the BBC Radio Theatre will be Dr Mirko Kovac, director of the Aerial Robotics Laboratory at Imperial College London, Lauren Fletcher, CEO of BioCarbon Engineering, Mya Padget, a licensed commercial drone pilot, Liam Young, one of the key people behind the Barbican’s Drones Orchestra, writer and poet Salena Godden with a specially commissioned poem about drones. Click also hears from Adrien Briod, Head of Technology at Flyability and Tero Heinonen, CEO of Sharper Shape about a Finnish drones delivery service.

(Photo: A Novadem NX 110 drone flies during a presentation at a firefighter rescue centre in Les Pennes-Mirabeau, France © AFP/Getty Images)

Producer: Colin Grant