It is anticipated that future skies over urban areas will be busy with drones flying back and forth delivering packages. Taking New York City as an extreme example, it is estimated that by 2026, 2600 delivery drones could simultaneously populate the city's airspace. The drone–drone collision rate of “dumb” drones can be calculated by treating them as a gas of large, randomly moving, spherical molecules, using the kinetic theory of gases. Collisions can be avoided by making each drone “smart,” i.e., by giving each a “sense and avoid” capability for detecting and avoiding a potential collision. For smart drones over New York City, the rate of potential collisions, or encounter rate, extends over a surprisingly large range: from 1 to 170,000 encounters/day, depending on input assumptions. This places stringent constraints on the probability that a smart drone encounter will result in a collision, constraints that must be met by the drone operator. Policy implications are discussed.

中文翻译：

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基于气体动力学理论的无人机与无人机在纽约市的碰撞

预计未来城市地区的天空将忙于无人机来回运送包裹。以纽约市为例，据估计，到 2026 年，将有 2600 架送货无人机可以同时进入该市的领空。“哑”无人机的无人机与无人机碰撞率可以通过使用气体动力学理论将它们视为大的、随机移动的球形分子的气体来计算。可以通过使每架无人机“智能”来避免碰撞，即通过赋予每架无人机检测和避免潜在碰撞的“感知和避免”能力。对于纽约市上空的智能无人机，潜在碰撞率或遭遇率的范围非常大：从 1 到 170,000 次/天，具体取决于输入假设。这对智能无人机遭遇导致碰撞的可能性施加了严格的限制，无人机操作员必须满足这些限制。讨论了政策影响。