Truck Driver Stories: Tommy, Automated Vehicle Operator
As part of Ike’s analysis of the impact of automation on truck driving jobs, we’re profiling a few real truck drivers and exploring how their work may change in the future.
Tommy drove trucks for 34 years, working in 47 states as a long-distance and local driver, and even owned his own company, until last June, when he started working with Ike. He says it’s the best job he’s ever had.
“I like the people and I like what we’re doing,” says Tommy, 56, who has been trucking ever since he spent four years in the military.
He says he appreciates Ike’s focus on making a notoriously dangerous industry safer. His work so far has been getting up to speed on the technology involved and driving routes with cameras mounted on the trucks to “map” hazards, construction sites, and the behavior of other vehicles on the road for software developers.
“I’m the oldest person at the company,” Tommy says. “There are software engineers who are younger than my youngest son. But that’s not an issue for me. I’m reading everything I can, and I’m enjoying learning.”
Tommy isn’t what you’d call a techie. Before last summer, he hadn’t touched a desktop computer for about seven years. Until recently he also opposed the push to automate trucking. But then late one night while driving in Texas, Tommy listened to a radio forum on the subject. One of the speakers, a corporate consultant, convinced him that automation wouldn’t necessarily put that many truckers out of work; there would still be lots of jobs for humans.
“I started looking into it more, and I was reassured,” Tommy says. “The long hauls might be automated but there’s no way you’re going to have robots driving hazardous loads and local routes.”
Q: What do you like most about your job?
A: I like being part of this big change in the industry that’s going to make it better overall. We’ll be taking some of the human error out of long-haul trucking. Safety is the top concern at my company.
Q: What is the hardest part?
A: I don’t like sitting at my desk while the engineers are working with the data, but I keep busy during those times, reading about the industry.
Q: What do most people misunderstand about your job?
A: A lot of people just don’t have the information, so they think automation will kill all the jobs. I didn’t either; I was totally against it until I learned more. There’s always going to be trucking. The over the road jobs may be affected, but the local driver jobs aren’t going anywhere. Some people also aren’t aware of the shortage of drivers. That’s been going on for years. So much so that they’re thinking of lowering the age to 18. I think that would be a big mistake.
How we see Tommy’s job changing
It doesn’t. Even when automated trucks are driving throughout the country, AVOs like Tommy will be needed to help test and improve new versions of the technology.
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