A passenger train in Miami demolished a food delivery robot Thursday evening after the autonomous device became stranded on railroad tracks.
Video of the incident shows the robot motionless at a crossing as the train bears down. Moments later, the train smashed into the robot, instantly tearing it apart before eventually coming to a stop.
Witness Guillermo Dapelo, who recorded the video, told news collection agency Storyful that he saw the incident around 8 p.m. while walking his dogs in the area.
He added that the robot had been stuck on the tracks for roughly 15 minutes before the train came barreling through.
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In the video, Dapelo can be heard repeatedly exclaiming, “Oh, it’s going to crash it,” just moments before the collision.
According to Dapelo, a nearby Uber Eats delivery driver contacted Coco Robotics, the company that owns the delivery bot, “to let them know where it was standing and within a matter of minutes the train approached and everything else is captured on the video.”
FOX Business reached out to Uber Eats for more information.
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Coco Robotics, which fulfills delivery orders for partners including restaurants, Uber Eats and DoorDash, told FOX Business that the robot was not making a delivery at the time of the incident.
Carl Hansen, vice president and head of government relations at Coco Robotics, told FOX Business that the robot “experienced a rare hardware failure while crossing railroad tracks,” calling the incident “extremely rare.”
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“Safety is always our top priority, which is why our robots operate at pedestrian speeds, yield to people, and are monitored in real time by human safety pilots,” Hansen said in a statement.
He added that Thursday’s incident represents one of the very few issues the company has encountered during its time operating in the city.
“Coco has been operating in Miami for over a year, traveling thousands of miles without major incidents, including crossing those same train tracks multiple times a day,” he said. “This was an unfortunate and extremely rare occurrence. While all hardware can experience unexpected failures from time to time, in this case, we’re grateful it was a Coco robot and not a vehicle. We’re reviewing the situation carefully to ensure it doesn’t happen again.”
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