4. A Tunnel and Some Debris

A plywood tunnel and a bunch of junk challenged vehicles in the DARPA Grand Challenge National Qualifying Event. Some managed to go through the tunnel and around or over the junk.

The Tunnel

Vehicles are supposed to navigate into and out of the plywood tunnel.

The plywood tunnel was designed to block GPS signals and force the vehicles to use other means of navigation. Most of the robots had no problem and smoothly entered and sailed through the tunnel. Upon exiting the tunnel, some vehicles became confused and veered off course. GPS signals often contain errors that can place you several meters away and many of the robots thought that they had "teleported" from where they were supposed to be.

Team ENSCO's DEXTER thinks tunnels are dumb.

A handle of robots proved too smart for their DARPA masters and decided to go around the tunnel. The pathfinding software on some robots saw an open route to the left and right. On one run, Team ENSCO's DEXTER vehicle really didn't want any part of the tunnel and crashed through the hay bale barrier to the left.

When you think about it, human beings probably would do the same thing. Some of the robots have been programmed to avoid dangerous situations and not slavishly follow GPS waypoints to their destruction. What would you do if you saw a plywood tunnel dropped into the #2 lane of a freeway? I would probably drive around it too.