Autane: An autonomous crane for sustained port operations

Fully automated cranes are revolutionizing modern port operations by addressing labor shortages, improving precision, and enhancing safety. Toward this goal, we present the Autane (autonomous crane) system specifically developed for rubber tire gantry (RTG) cranes handling standardized containers in port yards, enabling autonomous safety-critical container grabbing, transport, and placement with high accuracy, adaptability, and efficiency. Autane overcomes the challenges of safe motion of large-scale cranes with centimeter-level precision requirements, providing long-distance high-precision perception. It uses multisensor fusion, real-time obstacle detection, and simultaneous localization and mapping to perceive the environment, identify container features, and dynamically adjust trajectories. By tightly coupling perception, planning, control, and operation and maintenance, Autane achieves safe and precise alignment, seamless interaction with transport vehicles, and robust execution of long-distance handling tasks. Deployed in multiple ports, Autane shows full-day operation and has autonomously handled more than 2 million 20-foot equivalent units. This work highlights the potential of fully autonomous RTG cranes to enable sustained, resilient, and low-intervention port automation.