Systems and Methods for On-Site Recovery of Autonomous Vehicles

• US 20190235487A1
• Filed: 01/31/2018
• Published: 08/01/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 01/29/2018
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Uatc, LLC (Uber Technologies, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Uber Technologies, Inc.
• Inventors: Zhao, Dennis, Hanson, Eric James, Nix, Molly Castle, Chin, Sean
• Granted Patent: US 10,579,054 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0027 involving a plurality of vehicles, e.g. fleet or convoy travelling fleet control of land vehicles from a control room G05D1/0297; traffic control systems for road vehicles G08G1/00; for marine craft G08G3/00; for aircraft G08G5/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/40 Business processes related to the transportation industry shipping G06Q10/083
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/127 to a central station ; Indicators in a central station
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/44 for communication between vehicles and infrastructures, e.g. vehicle-to-cloud [V2C] or vehicle-to-home [V2H]

Abstract

Systems and methods for recovering an autonomous vehicle in a fleet of vehicles are provided. In one example embodiment, a computer-implemented method includes detecting an existence of an adverse condition associated with an autonomous vehicle in the fleet. The method includes determining in response to detecting the adverse condition, a recovery plan for the first autonomous vehicle based at least in part on one or more attributes associated with the adverse condition, the recovery plan including one or more actions to recover the first autonomous vehicle at a remote location. The method includes initiating the recovery plan to recover the first autonomous vehicle at the remote location.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for recovering an autonomous vehicle in a fleet of vehicles, the method comprising:

obtaining, by a computing system that includes one or more computing devices, data indicative of a status of each of a plurality of autonomous vehicles based on sensor data from one or more sensors onboard each of the plurality of autonomous vehicles;

transmitting, by the computing system one or more first control signals to the plurality of autonomous vehicles to travel to a plurality of strategic locations based on the status of each of the plurality of autonomous vehicles;

detecting, by the computing system, an existence of an adverse condition associated with a first autonomous vehicle in the fleet of vehicles, wherein the first autonomous vehicle is providing a vehicle service;

determining, by the computing system, in response to detecting the adverse condition, a second autonomous vehicle from the plurality of autonomous vehicles based at least in part on a remote location associated with the adverse condition and the plurality of strategic locations; and

transmitting, by the computing system one or more second control signals to the second autonomous vehicle to travel to the remote location to complete the vehicle service.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the second autonomous vehicle:

is determined to perform on-site recovery of the first autonomous vehicle based at least in part on one or more attributes associated with the adverse condition.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein transmitting, by the computing s stem, the one or more second control signals to the second autonomous vehicle to travel to the remote location to complete the vehicle service comprises:

controlling, by the computing system, the second autonomous vehicle to transport one or more members of a recovery team to the remote location, and

controlling, by the computing system, the second autonomous vehicle to drop-off the one or more members of the recovery team at the remote location.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the adverse condition is associated with at least one of a component failure in the first autonomous vehicle, an environment proximate to the first autonomous vehicle, or a user associated with the first autonomous vehicle.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein detecting the existence of the adverse condition comprises:

receiving, by the computing system, data indicative of the adverse condition from the first autonomous vehicle or a user device corresponding to a user associated with the first autonomous vehicle.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein determining, by the computing system, in response to detecting the adverse condition, a second autonomous vehicle from the plurality of autonomous vehicles based at least in part on a remote location associated with the adverse condition and the plurality of strategic locations comprises:

obtaining, by the computing system, data associated with the plurality of autonomous vehicles including a location of the plurality of autonomous vehicles; and

determining, by the computing system, the second autonomous vehicle from the plurality of autonomous vehicles based at least in part on a geographic proximity or a temporal proximity of the location of the second autonomous vehicle with respect to the remote location.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the adverse condition is associated with one or more attributes that include at least one of a characteristic of at least a portion of a surrounding environment of the first autonomous vehicle, a vehicle service associated with the first autonomous vehicle, or a user associated with the first autonomous vehicle.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

sending, by the computing system, in response to detecting the adverse condition one or more control signals to the first autonomous vehicle, the control signals comprising one or more vehicle maneuvers to he executed by the first autonomous vehicle.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing, by the computing system in response to detecting the adverse condition, data indicative of the adverse condition and a recovery plan for display via one or more display devices onboard the first autonomous vehicle.

21. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

updating, by the computing system, a set of strategic locations based on a change in the status of one or more of the plurality of autonomous vehicles; and

selecting, by the computing system, the plurality of strategic locations from the set of strategic locations based at least in part on the change in the status of the one or more of the plurality of autonomous vehicles.

22. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

selecting, by the computing system, the plurality of strategic locations based at least in part on one or more of a vehicle service demand, a supply of vehicles, an incident history, one or more characteristics of the plurality of vehicles, weather conditions, road conditions, or traffic conditions.

23. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of strategic locations are locations where the plurality of autonomous vehicles are positioned prior to deployment for assisting with vehicle services.

10. A computing system for recovering an autonomous vehicle, the system comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more tangible, non-transitory, computer readable media that collectively store instructions that when executed by the one or more processors cause the computing system to perform operations, the operations comprising;

obtaining data indicative of a status of each of a plurality of autonomous vehicles based on sensor data from one or more sensors onboard each of the plurality of autonomous vehicles;

transmitting one or more first control signals to the plurality of autonomous, vehicles to travel to a plurality of strategic locations based on the status of each of the plurality of autonomous vehicles;

detecting an existence of an adverse condition associated with a first autonomous vehicle in a fleet of vehicles, wherein the first autonomous vehicle is providing a vehicle service;

determining, in response to detecting the adverse condition, a second autonomous vehicle from the plurality of autonomous vehicles based at least in part on a remote location associated with the adverse condition and the plurality of strategic locations; and

transmitting one or more second control signals to the second autonomous vehicle to travel to the remote location to complete the vehicle service.

11. The computing system of claim 10, wherein the second autonomous vehicle is determined to perform on-site recovery of the first autonomous vehicle based at least in part on one or more attributes associated with the adverse condition.

12. The computing system of claim 11, wherein transmitting one or more second control signals to the second autonomous vehicle to travel to the remote location to complete the vehicle service comprises:

controlling the second autonomous vehicle to transport one or more members of a recovery team to the remote location; and

controlling the second autonomous vehicle to drop-off the one or more members of the recovery team at the remote location.

15. The computing system of claim 10, wherein determining, in response to detecting the adverse condition, a second autonomous vehicle:

from the plurality of

autonomous vehicles based at least in part on a remote location associated with the adverse condition and the plurality of strategic locations comprises;

obtaining data associated with the plurality of autonomous vehicles including a location of the plurality of autonomous vehicles; and

determining the second autonomous vehicle from the plurality of autonomous vehicles based at least in part on a geographic proximity or a temporal proximity of the location of the second autonomous vehicle with respect to the remote location.

17. The computing system of claim 10, further comprising:

sending, in response to detecting the adverse condition, one or more control signals to the first autonomous vehicle, the control signals comprising one or more vehicle maneuvers to be executed by the first autonomous vehicle.

18. The computing system of claim 10, further comprising:

providing, in response to detecting the adverse condition, data indicative of the adverse condition and a recovery plan for display via one or more display devices onboard the first autonomous vehicle.

13. (canceled)

14. (canceled)

16. (canceled)

19. An autonomous vehicle comprising:

one or more processors; and

one or more tangible, non-transitory, computer readable media that collectively store instructions that when executed by the one or more processors cause the one or more processors to perform operations, the operations comprising;

monitoring, via one or more sensors onboard the autonomous vehicle, one or more parameters associated with the autonomous vehicle while the autonomous vehicle is providing a vehicle service;

detecting an adverse condition associated with the autonomous vehicle based at least in part on the one or more parameters;

stopping a motion of the autonomous vehicle in response to detecting the adverse condition;

sending one or more communications to a remote computing system, the one or more communications including a request for assistance with the adverse condition;

receiving, from the remote computing system, data indicative of a second autonomous vehicle that is to complete the vehicle service, wherein the second autonomous vehicle is determined based at least in part on a remote location associated with the adverse condition and a plurality of strategic locations of a plurality of autonomous vehicles including the second autonomous vehicle; and

displaying data indicative of the adverse condition and a recovery plan based on the data indicative of the second autonomous vehicle via one or more display devices onboard the autonomous vehicle.

20. The autonomous vehicle of claim 19, further comprising:

receiving, from the remote computing system, one or more control signals comprising one or more vehicle maneuvers to be executed by the autonomous vehicle;

executing the one or more vehicle maneuvers;

determining an existence of the adverse condition after executing the one or more vehicle maneuvers; and

sending data indicative of the determination to the remote computing system.