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Humanoid robots still struggle<\/a> to accomplish real-world tasks with human-level dexterity. At the airport, though, they\u2019ve already proven perfectly capable of matching human incompetence.<\/p>\n A wild story out of Oakland, California shows what happens when you try to force a humanoid robot to fly coach. During a trip from Oakland to San Diego, a team of workers with the rental company Elite Event Robotics was traveling with Bebop, a 77-pound robot that appears to be a Unitree G1<\/a>.<\/p>\n To get from Oakland to San Diego is a 7.5 hour drive, so it can make sense to fly. Yet when the team rolled up with Bebop in toe, Southwest told them they couldn\u2019t check the robot as luggage due to weight restrictions. Failing that, they bought the bot its own seat on the plane, and that\u2019s where the trouble began.<\/p>\n As the robot\u2019s handlers tell it, flight attendants were \u2014\u00a0rightfully \u2014 concerned with how well the robot would behave on the flight.<\/p>\n \u201cThey come and start asking, \u2018what kind of batteries does it have? What\u2019s going on with this? X, Y, and Z.\u2019 They want to see it,\u201d Elite Event Robotics staffer Ben-Abraham told local media<\/a>. \u201cMeanwhile, I\u2019m watching his flight, and I keep seeing online: \u2018runway delay.’\u201d<\/p>\n Apparently, that back-and-forth lasted over an hour, during which the plane was stuck idling on the runway. In the end, Southwest confiscated Bebop\u2019s lithium battery, arguing that it broke the airline\u2019s size limit.<\/p>\n It\u2019s likely the first flight delay caused by a humanoid robot \u2014 a dubious distinction for any startup.<\/p>\n