The Communications and Mass Media Ministry has announced plans to have Russian mail delivered on unmanned airships, the TASS news agency reported.
Western companies such as Amazon and DHL already use delivery drones, but Minister Nikolai Nikiforov is thinking bigger.
"We're considering heavier devices: unmanned blimps capable of covering 400 kilometers with a payload of 200 kilograms," Nikiforov told journalists on Monday, adding that the blimp network would be meant for European Russia.
He was unable to provide a time frame for the deployment of such postal blimps because the use of unmanned airships would require approval from, and coordination with, other state agencies such as aviation watchdog Rosaviatsia.
Russia's postal service is notorious for delays and missing parcels, but the recently revamped management team at state monopoly Russian Post has been putting a lot of effort into improving the company's performance on the ground.
Blimp construction is undergoing a revival in recent years thanks to technological breakthroughs unavailable during the golden age of dirigibles in the early 20th-century's interwar period. Russia is among the trailblazers of the airship revival with its own privately owned blimp maker, Augur RosAeroSystems.
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