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Leading billionaire Jeff Bezos's pet aviation project might be a pilot seat too hot for most.

Not so for Australian David Carbon, the 54-year-old head of Amazon's drone delivery division, Prime Air. Or at least that's the cool vibe Carbon, an avid fan of AFL club Carlton, is projecting.

Bezos, who is now chairman of Amazon's board after he stepped down as chief executive in 2021, had lofty expectations for Amazon's delivery drones back in 2013 when he launched Prime Air.

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At the time, Bezos was clear Prime Air drones would face a number of challenges, but he predicted fleets would be whipping across the skies, making deliveries by 2018.

Turns out it is taking notably longer than that, largely a consequence of tough aviation safety regulations and the stringent testing requirements to successfully meet them.

But the concerns of some regulators over Prime Air appear, at least for now, assuaged, and persistent hard work by Carbon's aerospace team seems to have been rewarded with some critical momentum.

"It's a cool program," Carbon said, discussing the just-announced expansion of Prime Air into the United Kingdom and Italy, a significant development that takes Amazon drone deliveries outside the US for the first time.

"[Bezos] pioneered it and he takes great interest in it."

Carbon, who held powerful high-level postings at Boeing before moving to Amazon in 2020, seems to have the aviation pedigree to help steer the Bezos dream into reality.

The goals are big, as is the Amazon way.

Prime Air intends to deliver 500 million packages every year by the end of the decade.

Whether those drop-offs include Australia is, for now, unknown.

But Carbon is determined to see Amazon drones, like the freshly unveiled MK30 – Amazon's newest drone – delivering packages to suburbs in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and beyond.

"All these areas are perfect for drone delivery," he said.

"I don't intend to be exiting this job until we do bring this around the world, and Australia is definitely part of our plans.

"My old man worked at Qantas for 26 years. I grew up around the corner from Tullamarine (the site of Melbourne Airport).

"I'd like nothing more than to see this drone operating not just in Australia, but around the world."

That vision seemed to edge closer with last week's announcement that British and Italian regulators have welcomed Prime Air into yet-to-be-named locations for tests in their airspace, a potential door to go Europe-wide.

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Carbon said Prime Air had soundly made their case to those regulators, safely delivering "thousands of packages" across two towns in the US over the past year, and conducting millions of hours of flight simulations.

Deliveries with MK30 were statistically "hundreds of times" safer than someone driving to the shops to buy an item, he said.

And the convenience aspect speaks for itself.

"You can have a shower, a cup of tea, you can meditate, you can do whatever you want," Carbon said, "but in 30 minutes, it's going to be there."

The advanced MK30 can carry a package the size of a shoe box, with a maximum load of 2.3kgs, a payload which Amazon says is big enough to carry the kind of orders people seeking super-quick drone deliveries want, like AA batteries and medicines.

The greater capabilities of the MK30 – including longer flight times and a superior ability to navigate diverse weather and challenging terrain – only hint at what may lie in store.

Carbon said "some of the smartest people on Earth" have been working on Amazon's drone project, and the MK30 "unlocks" a new future.

"We'll introduce features to the drone like you would a car or an aeroplane.

"And as you add features, you add capability. And as you add capability you are able to expand further. That's our plan. That's what the roadmap says."

If Carbon does bring drone deliveries to Australia, they will be following Google's drone service Wing and a local company called Swoop Aero, both Civil Aviation Safety Authority-approved operators.

Wing has been making deliveries to homes in North Canberra and Logan, Queensland since 2021.

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Swoop Aero, headquartered in Melbourne, has a slightly different mission: drone delivery of medical supplies up to 60 kilometres away from a base station.

The race for aerial dominance is on.

"Frankly, it doesn't matter to us what everybody else is doing," Carbon said, in response to Google beating Amazon to the punch in Australia.

"This is about our customers and the communities we operate over.

"Our approach has been purely simple to start with: the safety aspects of our drone, and not just to talk about safety, but design safety. That means the drone being able to respond to unknown events in a known fashion, the way Boeing or Airbus would when they design their planes."

Amazon will, Carbon declares, "bring that rigour" to drone delivery to "create history".

The breakthrough in Italy and UK will have pleased Bezos, however he's undoubtedly already asking what's next. You don't become one of the world's richest people by patting yourself on the back.

Carbon is under no illusions that Bezos is deeply invested in the drone division, but said he doesn't feel heat from the Amazon chairman.

"I just feel pressure to do stuff right for our customers. And that's a self imposed pressure."

The reporter travelled to Seattle for the 'Delivering the Future' media event as a guest of Amazon. Amazon did not pay for this content.

A police investigation is under way after a gunman went on a rampage, threatening people and plunging a small town in Western Australia's Wheatbelt into lockdown.

The terror began about 100 kilometres south of Perth when a black Mitsubishi Triton stopped at the scene of a car crash on Albany Highway in Bannister at 5.20pm on Saturday, police said.

The five motorists from that car wanted to help the occupants of a red Holden Commodore sedan that had crashed.

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A passenger from the Triton ute went over to the crashed car when a man carrying a firearm and a woman appeared from nearby bushes, police said.

The good Samaritans were allegedly shot at twice before fleeing.

Next, a couple from Williams tried to help at the crash site.

They were also confronted by the same pair and their gold Volvo station wagon was stolen at gunpoint, police said.

The alleged offenders drove nearly 300 kilometres to the small town of Merredin.

It was there about 10.30pm that it's believed the gunman and woman followed another motorist.

The man pointed a firearm at the female driver, who managed to get away, police said.

The ordeal plunged the town into lockdown, with locals told by text message to protect themselves and stay indoors.

A total of 90 people barricaded themselves inside the local pub. 

"We'd just called last drinks at 10 to 12 and then the phone rang and it was the police saying to make sure no one left," pub owner Jason Williams said.

Just before midnight, the 24-year-old woman who was with the gunman was arrested.

The gunman continued driving, stopping a kilometre from the town. He then died from self-inflicted injuries.

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Police and community leaders said what happened "doesn't get any scarier".

"It's a tragic event and it affects many people," Merredin Shire president Mark Mckenzie said.

"To have a firearm pointed at you like what happened in this situation, no doubt would have been terrifying for those people involved," WA Police Commander Scott Warner said.

"The strength of the West Australian community is that as community members, we like to help each other out, and I'd hate to see a time that that changes." 

Police are looking for dashcam footage.

Crisis support is available from Lifeline on 13 11 14.

Support is available from Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636.

Two children have been killed and two others are fighting for life after a shed fire at a property in Corio, near Geelong.

The four children were playing inside the shed when the fire broke out, trapping them inside in what police have described as "a horrific scene".

Neighbour Darren Cheesman told 9News he was "pretty shocked".

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"You don't think it's going to happen down the road from you," he said.

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Victoria Police Inspector Emma Bartel said "it was very much a chaotic scene".

"It's a tragic and awful event that has happened.

"For the sake of the families that are involved, we owe it to them to find out what took place and give them some answers."

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Heartbreak was felt by even the most experienced first responders who turned up at the scene as the tragedy unfolded about 10.30am.

"This is a horrific scene," Bartel said.

"Many of our officers and our fellow emergency services are parents as well.

"There is a lot of this community rallying together for the household, the families that are involved."

It is understood that a mother of at least one of the children was at home at the time. She was not injured.

Police are still working out how the children were connected.

The arson squad remained at the scene as they tried to establish exactly what caused the blaze.

At this stage they say the fire isn't suspicious, but rather a tragic accident.

A report will be prepared for the coroner.

Corio is one of the largest suburbs of Geelong, about 67km away from Melbourne.

After being asked “what’s up”, the man pointed the machete towards the group.