Skis and carriages: Surprising ways Amazon delivers to remote areas
FILE – The Amazon DTW1 fulfillment center is shown in Romulus, Mich., April 1, 2020. Amazon announced Thursday, July 21, 2022, it will acquire the primary care organization One Medical in a deal valued roughly at $3.9 billion, marking another expansion for the retailer into health care services. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)
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(WJW) – If you live in a city, ordering from Amazon is a cinch. There are many places where an Amazon truck can’t drive, however. In those cases, the company deploys some unusual modes of transport to deliver, including skis, motorbikes, helicopters and horse-drawn carriages.
These are some of Amazon’s most remote delivery destinations:
Approximately four square miles in size, the island is home to fewer than 500 year-round residents who rely on horse-drawn carriages, bicycles, and snowmobiles to get around. Cars and trucks were banned from the island at the end of the nineteenth century. A package delivered to the island starts at a Michigan fulfillment center. From there, it’s taken to a ferry. Once it gets to the island, it’s picked up by a horse and dray carriage to be delivered around town.
Frying Pan Tower, North Carolina
Frying Pan Tower is 30 miles off the coast of North Carolina in the Atlantic Ocean. Amazon deliveries are made by chopper to a former U.S. Coast Guard tower. Packages ship out of Raleigh, then ride a truck to the airport, where they’re picked up by a helicopter. The chopper than lands right on the tower to drop off the packages.
The remote Tauplitz Mountain Village isn’t just hard to get to, it also receives significant snowfall. Snow or shine, packages are delivered on skis. Postmaster Helmut Edelmaier, better known as Heli, has been delivering on skis for 15 years. Despite the trek, packages can still arrive within one day.
Leh is in the middle of the Himalayan mountains at more than 11,000 feet elevation. There are just two roadways into the town. Some of the delivery routes aren’t even on a map. The delivery team is made up of people who grew up in the area, and who know how to navigate around high mountain passes and rock slides via motorbike.