Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/978209
PULSE May 2018 | Overdrive | 5 It seems most autonomous car wrecks point to the "mushy middle of automation," as autonomy expert Bryant Walker Smith called it in the Wall Street Journal. "It's dangerous when people feel safer than they actually are," says Smith, an assistant professor of law at the University of South Carolina. Indeed. In two fatal accidents this year, safety drivers were behind the wheel of cars with some level of autonomous capability. In 2016, an inattentive Tesla driver died when his car drove under a white dry van because the car's detection system didn't notice it against the bright sky. Tesla defended itself, saying its Autopilot mode instructions re- quired the driver's full attention. That illustrates the real problem, which is the double message inherent in these inci- dents: You can let this car drive itself, but you can't really let this car drive itself. One solution at this stage would be to scale back how easy it is for ordinary four-wheelers to drive in a semi-au- tonomous vehicle where they're supposed to be 100 percent alert. For research and development, drivers pass- ing strict screening and preparation should be able to handle test runs that require total vigilance. There are no doubt many driving circumstances, like the white trailer incident, that need to be identified and resolved before we launch even more vehicles onto public highways piloted by machines and presump- tuous drivers. Tesla alone already has thou- sands of Autopilot-equipped cars on the road. It's been suggested that autonomous-driv- ing development should skip the "mushy mid- dle." Technically, that's Level III operation, where a safety driver is required but the mon- itoring isn't as demanding as in Level II, where most testing has taken place. Then it would progress to Level IV, where the technology is so advanced that the vehicle is fully autonomous with minor possible exceptions, and Level V, where the vehicle is truly and safely self-driving. Skipping Level III was the prediction of three panelists at the recent Technology & Maintenance Council annual meeting, as reported by my colleague Jeff Crissey, editor of Commercial Carrier Journal. Experts say that as marvelous as new crash-avoidance tech- nology is, it still can't analyze far enough ahead to alert the driver of some rapidly devel- oping problems. The Journal notes a 2015 study that found some drivers in autonomous vehicles took 17 seconds to regain control of their vehicle. That's about 1,700 times too slow. Platooning behind a manned truck might be achievable in the not-so-distant future. Like- wise for low-speed autonomous trucks at docks and certain other drayage applications, just as the mining industry has pioneered. Level IV autonomy in cars or trucks on public highways could be decades away. If that's what it takes, it's worth waiting for. Self-driving's 'mushy middle' mheine@randallreilly.com By Max Heine Editorial director would be required after 11 hours of driving, and a 24- hour restart of the cumulative on-duty limits would be part of the mix. Prior to April 9, John Allen of LifeontheRoads.com and Andrea Marks of ELD or Me/ Trucker Nation came together for an April 2 meeting with FMCSA officials that Allen set up. With other haulers and Mat- thew Kane of the MyRiteLoad platform in tow, among others, the group also focused on hours, particularly splitting the sleeper berth more liberally. "We were trying to get the [required 10- hour off-duty period] to be split to stop the 14-hour clock" in more than just 8-hour/2-hour periods, says Allen. What's resulted is work on a petition to allow sleeper split- ting when at least a three-hour rest period is taken to stop the 14-hour clock. "Not only would this allow for everyone's different sleep- ing habits" and not penalize a driver for making a safety call to get off the road, says ELD or Me group founder Tony Justice, "it will also relieve some of the lack of parking." References were made to FMCSA's own movement toward a naturalistic study of how split sleep affects fatigue – or not – among truckers. Regarding the study, Marks says, FMCSA "very explicitly stated they are closer than ever to [allowing use of] the split sleeper berth." "Soon" in regulatory time means something different than what it does in the real world. Marks suggested that 12 to 18 months would be about as fast as a process of this magnitude could move. Early publicity for autonomous truck development high- lighted the potential for drivers to disengage from driving while the truck drove itself.