Bird poop was enough to disable a self-driving truck, driver claims

[Wimberly Patton]

A truck driver took to Facebook to share a glaring downside to self-driving semi trucks with his fellow drivers.

In the post, the truck driver claims he was at a truck stop when a driver in an autonomous rig pulled up. According to the post, the driver in the autonomous truck had to stop the rig because its autopilot had been disabled by bird poop on the camera.

“He said the truck stopped driving because a bird pooped on the camera radar,” read a portion of the post.

“That’s not good when bird :: can disable one of these self-driving trucks,” read another part.

Apparently, Waymo became aware of this issue years ago, and has since designed a mini ‘windshield wiper’ type device for the lenses for just this scenario, reported Jalopnik.

Even so, the truck in this post doesn’t seem to be equipped with this special custom wiper technology.

“Technology brought down to its knees by bird ::, back to the drawing board nerds,” commented one driver.

“When the collision warning radar in my truck warns of phantoms and panic hits the brakes makes me question robotic trucks,” wrote another.

The post serves as more proof that you just can’t replace truck drivers.



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