Trucking Company Deploys Self-Driving 18-Wheeler Where Human Employee Can Chill Out and Watch YouTube Videos in the Back as It Bombs Down the Highway

Last month, Aurora Innovation became the first company to manage almost completely driver trucks without a driver on American highways.

And through “completely driver without a driver”, we mean that no one – and not a soul – sits in the driver’s seat where the independent truck performed its first official delivery, which highlights along the 45th Highway in Texas with 25,000 pounds of frozen treatments in the clouds.

In fact, there was zero human supervision. At least, nUnless your idea of ​​supervision is a man who was left in the back of the truck cabin, and watching YouTube videos on his phone, because the other suckers on the road may have focused on not falling victim to the country most of the country Death driver’s death traps.

“I may be in the truck, but I am just a passenger,” Aurora CEO, Chris Ormson, wrote In writing About his background experience during the opening truck. “I spent time by chatting with our team, formulating this blog, and watching YouTube.”

Ormmson considered this achievement “the moment of water gatherings.” Indeed, the total trucks without a driver in Aurora recorded more than 1,200 miles without a driver in performing real delivery operations along I-45, with plans to expand its fleet to 20 large platforms by the end of the year, New York Times I mentioned. Unlike human drivers, trucks do not have to follow the daily driving limit for 11 hours. And they, Aurora insists, certainly safe.

Ormmson told the “Ormmson” newspaper Newton.

Urra trucks are independent of 4 levels on the SAE scale, which means that it can lead itself in light of limited circumstances and does not require that a person take over. For comparison, consumers’ self-driving features such as Tesla- which are technically the driver-2 level aid systems 2. Robotics, such as Waymo’s width, is level 4.

The cracks began to appear, and this raises that it was completely without a driver not long. Less than three weeks after Aurora launched her service, startup Declare He was returning the human supervisor in the driver’s seat. No more YouTube videos for Mr. Ormmson.

This was done at the request of Paccar, the Paccar manufacturer for the PEERBILT trucks that Aurora prepared its systems. It’s blurry why. in Blog post We assume that he was not composed of the back of one of his trucks, Ormmson participated only that “because of some parts of the initial model in [Paccar’s] Base vehicle platform, “without explaining more.

There Coverageand Intuition quote Report a short seller It suggested that Aurora and Bakar did not see face to face around the timing of the driver’s operations; In fact, the Peterbilt logo was removed in some of the Aurora photos used to celebrate its launch.

Regardless of companies’ conspiracies, truck drivers are concerned about the risks offered by Aurora – not to mention the clear threat to their livelihoods.

“It is possible that it will be a catastrophic from the safety perspective,” said John Samuelsen, head of the US Transport Workers Union. Newton.

Angela Griffin, the veteran driver, who was concerned that the trucks would not be able to deal with chaotic traffic and difficult weather conditions.

Griffin remembered how the rain confused the fog lights, the lights operating in Amnesty International on its own truck. In fact, the Aurora Fleet is only designed to work during the day in clear weather conditions. For this reason there are human supervisors: to take over if things are wet.

Philip Kobman, an engineering professor at Carnegie Mellon, said that Ura was more feasible to safety than her competitors, but he highlighted the lack of government organization. He stressed that there is nothing to say, how will vehicles interact with unexpected obstacles.

“This technology is really good in the things it is practicing, and it is really bad in the unprecedented things before,” Kobman told Copeman. Newton. “From the point of view of safety, no one knows how it will turn.”

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