Pendleton Archives - Northwest Public Broadcasting

Amazon Drone Deliveries Nearly Ready For Prime Time With Oregon Crashes In Rear-View Mirror

By Tom Banse June 28, 2022

This latest iteration of Amazon's package delivery drones will be used to drop off packages in customers' backyards.

Amazon made news this month by announcing it will start package deliveries by aerial drone to real customers in a northern California town. In the run up to the U.S. debut, the company conducted extensive flight tests in Eastern Oregon, where it experienced a spate of crashes. Amazon said Monday the upcoming rollout of commercial drone delivery signifies the refined Read More

Santa’s Reindeer To Get Competition: Amazon Flight-Testing Package Delivery Drones In Pendleton

By Tom Banse November 19, 2021

The uncrowded skies at the Pendleton UAS Test Range have attracted Amazon to conduct package delivery drone testing. Amazon gave no details about the prototypes it is test flying there.

E-commerce giant Amazon confirmed to public radio that it has begun flight testing of package delivery drones at a test range in Pendleton, Oregon, as well as continuing near Seattle and elsewhere. Routine delivery of online orders to consumers by aerial drones remains a long ways off, though. Read More

In Pendleton, Rounding Up High Schoolers For A Graduation Before Grabbing Life By The Horns

By Anna King May 28, 2020

Pendleton High School senior Marcus Aaron Luke, left, was excited and ready for his last year running track. Then coronavirus disrupted everyone's plans. CREDIT: Marcus Luke (father)

Marcus Aaron Luke was a leader on his varsity track team, and also a senior at Pendleton High School. Now, like seniors everywhere, he’s missing a traditional graduation. But the city’s famous Round-Up grounds have a fix. Read More

Helicopter Rescues, Roads Closed, Sandbags Filled: SE Washington And NE Oregon Hit With Floods

By Anna King February 9, 2020

Many houses in Waitsburg, Washington, a small wheat town, are still sitting in lakes of trapped water. Residents were busy moving out their valuables, and accessing damage on Saturday, Feb. 8, 2020. CREDIT: Anna King/N3

Flood waters in southeastern Washington and northeastern Oregon are starting to recede. But this relatively good news follows days of bad news and inundated towns – along with collapsed bridges, dozens of helicopter rescues and washed-out roads. It’s all caused by recent heavy rainfall and fast-melting snow. Read More

Robo Air Taxi Testing Wraps Up At Pendleton Airport, And Airbus Moves On

By Tom Banse December 14, 2019

Airbus displayed the Vahana prototype at a trade association event in Pendleton on Oct. 3, 2019. CREDIT: Tom Banse-N3

Airbus has wrapped up flight testing of a pilotless air taxi in eastern Oregon skies and is moving on. The global aerospace company, along with its rival Boeing and many others, is striving to make flying cars an option for your urban commute someday. Read More

‘It’s Cool And It’s Real’: More Than 100 Successful Test Flights Of Robo Air Taxi Over Eastern Oregon

By Tom Banse October 8, 2019

Vahana Project head of flight test Matt Deal. CREDIT: TOM BANSE/N3

Airbus, along with its rival Boeing and many others, is striving to make flying cars an option for your urban commute. The enthusiasm around the test flight hangar in Pendleton, Oregon, has to be leavened, though. Industry insiders said the technology is running years ahead of regulators and public acceptance. Read More

‘Not One Drop Of Blood’: Cattle Are Being Mysteriously Mutilated And Killed In Eastern Oregon

By Anna King September 13, 2019

A fog of dust is kicked up from hooves as cowboys quietly push cattle into a corral from a big draw on Silvies Valley Ranch near Burns, Oregon. CREDIT: ANNA KING/N3

Right now in remote eastern Oregon, a serial crime spree is unfolding. Young purebred bulls are mysteriously showing up dead. Cowboys recently found several animals with body parts precisely removed -- and it’s happened just like this before in the West. Read More

All-Black Army Battalion Members Get Their Due 75 Years After Wartime Mission Over Northwest

By Tom Banse September 6, 2019

Paratroopers at Pendleton Army Airfield getting briefed before taking off to drop on a wildfire in the summer of 1945. NATIONAL ARCHIVES / VIA EASTERN WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY

Triple Nickles thought they were destined for Japan when they stopped at Pendleton Army Airfield in the spring of 1945. But no, they were about to be converted into smokejumpers for Operation Firefly. Professional smokejumping started in 1939 in Washington's Methow Valley. Read More

In Eastern Oregon, Pendleton Has Become A Drone-Testing Hub, With Hopes For More

By Tom Banse November 12, 2018

The latest variant of the Cubic Ares unmanned reconnaissance drone during flight testing at Pendleton on October 28. CREDIT: CUBIC CORP.

A dream to make rural Pendleton, Oregon into a drone testing mecca is becoming very real. It's so real, in fact, that the city-owned airport has run out of hangar space to rent to global aerospace companies. Now, the Pendleton airport is seeking millions more in public funding to help expand. Read More