🆘🆘Everyone's watching humanoid robots try to drive Teslas. The largest autonomous vehicle fleet on Earth has been running for 16 years — and it isn't Tesla.
It's Caterpillar and Komatsu.
Over 700 fully autonomous haul trucks operate right now across mining sites in Australia, Chile, and Canada. Each weighs 400+ tons, hauls 300+ tons of ore. No driver. Running since 2008.
Rio Tinto's Pilbara operation, current numbers:
- 130+ autonomous trucks in daily service
- Fatalities on those routes: zero
- Productivity vs human-operated: +20-30%
- 24/7 operation, no shift changes
Mining solved autonomy by removing what makes cities hard — no pedestrians, private roads, fixed routes, predictable loads.
Cat Command and Komatsu FrontRunner didn't wait for perfect. They solved it where it's easiest, then scaled from there.
The next wave — Kodiak, Aurora, Einride — is bringing the same playbook to highway freight. Fixed routes first. Cities never.
Everyone waiting for Optimus to drive their kid to soccer is watching the wrong sport. The robots that drive for a living have been at it for 16 years.
Bookmark. Follow if you'd rather know which vehicles autonomy already conquered than argue about the ones it hasn't.
☠️ THE ROBOT ON THIS ROOF IS NOT THERE TO WORK FASTER. IT IS THERE TO WORK AFTER DARK.
Every roofer knows the moment. Half the roof is open, the forecast just moved rain up to five, and somebody has to decide whether to keep tearing or start closing.
Guess wrong once and you are not paying for a roof anymore. You are paying for ceilings, floors, stock and somebody else's lost week.
That decision only exists because people have to go home. The machine keeps tearing at 9pm with a lamp strapped to its back and never has to make the call.
Skeptical bit: a legged robot on wet torn membrane is a strange choice, and the clip cuts before anyone hauls a single load of debris down, which is the actual labour.
What is the job in your world where guessing wrong about the weather costs more than the job pays?