Rio Tinto is hailing the successful roll out of its AutoHaul autonomous freight train system across its iron ore operations in Western Australia.

AutoHaul is the latest piece in Rio Tinto's automation program titled "Mine of the Future" that began in 2008.  It was July of last year that AU$1.2 Billion AutoHaul system completed its first successful run in the Pilbara region.  By October 2017, it had run more than one million kilometers at 34 trains per day.

"Over the coming months we will continue to refine our autonomous operations to ensure we are able to maximise value," said Rio Tinto Iron Ore managing director for rail, port and core services Ivan Vella.  "We continue to work closely with drivers during this period and do not expect to make any redundancies in 2019 as a result of the deployment of AutoHaul."

In the decade since its announcement, The AutoHaul program has expanded to incorporate drills, trains and even smaller vehicles such as light trucks.