Out of the cooler and into the history books.
Fully loaded with a cargo of Budweiser beer, a self-driving truck delivered the first known commercial shipment of goods under autonomous operations last week. With software created by self-driving truck pioneer Otto, a tractor-trailer departed a weigh station along Interstate 25 in Fort Collins, Colorado, last week, and drove without incident in fully autonomous mode 120 miles south to Colorado Springs, reaching a maximum speed of 55 mph along the way. Otto and Anheuser-Busch announced the development this morning.
The truck completed the on-ramp-to-exit journey without human intervention. Otto executives and Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) officials hailed the demonstration as a landmark step toward safer roads and a trucking industry that could be more nimble if drivers are able to rest while the truck drives for portions of the journey. But there are questions about how the project was vetted. In a press release summarizing the venture, Otto says a professional truck driver was in the vehicle the entire route, monitoring the delivery from the sleeper berth?a location that would leave him or her unable to respond to any immediate problems that arose along the way.
For testing purposes, other states require a driver behind the wheel. In California, for example, where more than a dozen automotive and technology companies have logged years of experience testing self-driving vehicles, a law requires that a human...