Apparatus and methods for monitoring autonomous vehicles

An autonomous vehicle tracking system comprising

• a plurality of autonomous vehicles, each of the plurality of autonomous vehicles comprising a control system, the control system including a plurality of sensors providing signals indicative of real-time information regarding the location and operation of the autonomous vehicle, and a camera system providing a signal representative of images of the environment surrounding the autonomous vehicle, and a controller including a processor and a memory device, the memory device including instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to receive signals from the sensors and the camera system, aggregate the signals to create an array of data that is a composite of the sensor signals and the camera signals that represents a time-sequenced composite image file that superimposes data derived from the sensor signals onto the images from the camera system,
• a plurality of cameras positioned in the working environment of the plurality of autonomous vehicles, the cameras providing a signal representative of images of portions of the working environment of the plurality of autonomous vehicles, the cameras including memory to store an array of data that represents a time-sequenced image file for the field of view of the particular camera, and
• a centralized monitoring station including a user input device, an operator head set, and a computer in communication with the user input device and operator head set, the computer operable to transmit a signal to each of the autonomous vehicles and cameras to simultaneously change the point of time that the time-sequenced images are presented such that an operator may toggle between the views of each of the autonomous vehicles and each of the cameras at a coordinated point in time, the portion of the image file being transmitted by each autonomous vehicle being responsive to the position of the operator head set.

An autonomous vehicle management system comprising

• a plurality of autonomous vehicles, each autonomous vehicle including
• a vehicle camera system, and
• a controller including a processor and a memory device, the memory device including instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to receive signals from the vehicle camera system, aggregate the signals to create an array of data that is a represents a time-sequenced image file from the vehicle camera system,
• an environmental camera system providing signal representative of images of the environment surrounding the plurality of autonomous vehicles, the environmental cameras including memory to store an array of data that represents a time-sequenced image file for the field of view of the particular camera, and
• a centralized monitoring station including
• a computer in communication with the controller each autonomous vehicle, the computer including a processor and a memory device,
• a user input device in communication with the computer,
• a head set, in communication with the computer,
• wherein the memory device of the computer includes instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to process inputs from the user input device to communicate with the controller of the autonomous vehicle to prompt the controller transmit portions of the time-sequenced image file under the control of the user input device, the transmitted image file being received by the computer and displayed by the head set, transmit a signal to each of the autonomous vehicles and environmental cameras to simultaneously change the point of time that the time-sequenced images are presented such that an operator may toggle between the views of each of the autonomous vehicles and each of the environmental cameras at a coordinated point in time, the portion of the image file being transmitted by each autonomous vehicle being responsive to the position of the operator head set.