{"id":682338,"date":"2025-07-31T02:55:20","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T23:55:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/auroras-autonomous-trucks-are-now-driving-at-night-its-next-big-challenge-is-rain\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T02:55:20","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T23:55:20","slug":"auroras-autonomous-trucks-are-now-driving-at-night-its-next-big-challenge-is-rain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/auroras-autonomous-trucks-are-now-driving-at-night-its-next-big-challenge-is-rain\/","title":{"rendered":"Aurora’s autonomous trucks are now driving at night. Its next big challenge is rain."},"content":{"rendered":"
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Over the next year, Aurora Innovation CEO Chris Urmson wants to \u201cunlock\u201d the Sunbelt of the United States, a southern route where its self-driving trucks will carry goods for companies like Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines. <\/p>\n

Aurora, which launched its driverless commercial self-driving truck service this spring, has already made some progress towards that goal. The company reported Wednesday in its second-quarter letter to shareholders that it now has three self-driving trucks operating commercially between Dallas and Houston and logged more than 20,000 driverless miles by the end of June. Its commercial self-driving trucks have a human \u201cobserver\u201d in the cab, people who are not there to operate or intervene, according to the company. <\/p>\n

Aurora has also opened up a terminal in Phoenix, another physical sign of its Sunbelt trucking route mission. Aurora is piloting autonomous trucking on a 15-hour route from its terminal in Fort Worth, Texas to Phoenix for customers, Hirschbach and Werner. The company\u2019s terminals, which are located within one to five miles from the highway, require the driverless trucks to handle exits and surface streets. <\/p>\n

But it\u2019s the company\u2019s ability to operate at night that helps it push into new territory. Aurora said Wednesday it has validated the ability for its driverless trucks to navigate highways and roads at night. This allows the trucks to travel<\/a> longer distances \u2014 and importantly past the federally mandated service limitation for traditional human drivers. Truck drivers are allowed to drive up to 11 hours over a 14-hour period; and they can\u2019t do that day after day. Truck drivers are also required to take 10-hour breaks after completing a long-haul route.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe value is really on longer lengths \u2014 so 600 miles is certainly a good range, where that is on the border of what\u2019s possible for people,\u201d Urmson told TechCrunch in a recent interview, adding that ultimately he hopes Aurora trucks are carrying freight from Miami to California. <\/p>\n

Urmson partially credits Aurora\u2019s proprietary, long-range lidar, which can detect objects in the dark more than 450 meters away, for its ability to operate at night. The lidar can identify pedestrians, vehicles, and debris up to 11-seconds sooner than a traditional driver, according to the company. Aurora has acquired two lidar companies since it was founded in 2017. The company bought Blackmore, a Montana-based lidar startup, in May 2019 and OURS Technology<\/a> in 2021. <\/p>\n

Now, Urmson and the rest of Aurora\u2019s engineers are working to validate the driverless trucks\u2019 ability to operate in rain. <\/p>\n

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Techcrunch event<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSan Francisco<\/span>
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t|<\/span>
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOctober 27-29, 2025<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cBy the end of the year, we expect to be operating day, night, and in rain \u2014 if you can\u2019t drive through the rain, ultimately, it\u2019s hard to support these long operations because it\u2019s raining somewhere,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Today, Aurora\u2019s development fleet does operate in the rain and well enough that Urmson noted most would wonder why the company isn\u2019t allowing its commercial trucks to do the same. Aurora has not completed the validation for that today, and \u201cso we\u2019re not willing to put that check mark next to it and let it go out there,\u201d he noted. <\/p>\n

Today, the company monitors weather on its one commercial route between Dallas and Houston. If adverse weather conditions like rain suddenly arise, those trucks are able to detect this and pull themselves off the road on their own where they will wait to be rescued, Urmson said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis year is really about building the capability toolbox so that the vehicles can drive where they need to,\u201d he said in a nod to the company\u2019s focus on validating driving at night and in the rain. <\/p>\n

Next year, Aurora will focus on scaling its road network, in terms of distances and its fleet. Aurora plans to have \u201ctens of driverless trucks\u201d operating on public roads by the end of the year and \u201chundreds\u201d by the end of 2026.<\/p>\n

All of this, from the driverless trucks\u2019 ability to function at night and in rain to opening more routes and a with a larger fleet, will be critical if Aurora ever hopes to reach profitability. <\/p>\n

The revenue-to-net income gap today is a large one. Aurora reported revenue of $1 million in the second quarter and a net income loss of $201 million, according to its regulatory filing<\/a>. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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If you want to read more like this article, you can visit our Technology<\/a><\/span> category.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the next year, Aurora Innovation CEO Chris Urmson wants to \u201cunlock\u201d the Sunbelt of the United States, a southern route where its self-driving trucks will carry goods for companies like Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines. Aurora, which launched its driverless commercial self-driving truck service this spring, has already made some progress towards that…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":682339,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/tc-backlight-e1689786273147.png?w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[152524,157908,73295],"class_list":["post-682338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-aurora-innovation","tag-self-driving-trucks","tag-transportation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=682338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/682338\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/682339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=682338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=682338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=682338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}