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from the darn-it-someone-must-take-the-blame dept.
Uber's self driving car program in AZ isn't out of the woods yet. The Phoenix New Times https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/claim-ducey-state-blamed-uber-self-driving-death-unsafe-policy-11205678 reported last month that lawyers representing family of Uber victim Herzberg have sued the state of AZ for $10M, fingering Governor Ducey for failing to protect the people of his state.
After quoting legal precedent about the state's responsibility to keep roadways "reasonably safe" for travelers, the claim says the state has "failed to make roadways safe, allowing autonomous vehicles to operate on public roadways in an unsafe manner."
The state's oversight of autonomous vehicles was negligent, it states, adding that Ducey's 2015 executive order facilitating the testing of self-driving vehicles was created "negligently and without sufficient investigation into the safety of Uber's autonomous vehicles. Any oversight provided by a committed, ADOT, or DPS, was wholly insufficient, and placed an unreasonably high risk of harm to the citizens of Arizona."
The claim goes on to quote Ducey's 2016 invitation to Uber, in which the governor quipped that "California put the brakes on innovation and change," but he wouldn't. "This rush to be first in the 'tech boom' era made Arizona's roadways unreasonably dangerous," the claim states.
New Times made a similar argument that Ducey was at least partially responsible for Herzberg's death in the April 12 cover story, "Ducey's Drive-By: How Arizona Governor Helped Cause Uber's Fatal Self-Driving Car Crash."
Last time Gov. Ducey appeared here on SN was back on December 03 2016, https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=16/12/02/2341241 He announced that Lucid would start making cars in a new plant in AZ...in 2018. Looks like he missed that prediction --
Officials from electric vehicle startup Lucid Motors, which broke cover from stealth mode in October [cnet.com], made a joint appearance today with Arizona Governor Doug Ducey and Sonora, Mexico's Governor Claudia Pavlovich Arellano, to announce a manufacturing plant in Casa Grande, Arizona. The plant will begin production of Lucid's first car, an electric luxury sedan, in 2018, with parts being supplied from across the border in Sonora, Mexico.
Governor Ducey said the new plant will create 2,000 jobs by 2022 [cnet.com], and that Lucid Motors has promised to prioritize hiring among Arizona veterans.
Lucid Motors has shown a very sophisticated operation for its entry as a new automaker, with its Chief Technology Officer, Peter Rawlinson, an alumni of Tesla and Lotus, and Vice President of Design Derek Jenkins having spent time at Mazda and Volkswagen. The as-yet unnamed first model will compete with the Tesla Model S as a luxury sedan, and should boast over 300 miles of range. Lucid has also designed connected features and self-driving capability into this car.
(Score: 5, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Monday March 18 2019, @01:44AM (2 children)
As I understand the report, the computer system flagged her first as unknown object, then as a vehicle, then as a bicycle, and for some reason even then delayed emergency braking, and despite flagging the need for emergency braking 1.3 seconds before the collision, still decelerated only minimally before striking her. (I believe because the system had automatic emergency braking disabled.)
If she had instead been a vehicle or some large piece of something in the road or whatever (as the system first thought but took no action) any passengers in the self-driving car could have been seriously injured or killed.
So, regardless of what percentage of blame you want to fault the victim with, the response of the computer system still showed serious issues that contributed to a bad outcome.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Tuesday March 19 2019, @12:12AM (1 child)
Doesn't matter. Anyone with an IQ over 70 looks both ways before crossing the street and, if a car is coming, they wait.
This dipshit didn't. This dipshit walked into incoming traffic and got killed. So sad, too bad, not a whole lot of sympathy here. Self driving car, drunk driver, dude coming off a 14 hour shift, wide awake mom with kids in the back seat, normal dude changing radio stations. Doesn't matter.
The driver may be legally at fault, but the asshat that can't be bothered to look for oncoming traffic IMHO got what they deserved.
I came. I saw. I forgot why I came.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 19 2019, @02:15PM
She paid with her life. How did Uber pay for it's screw up? With a suspension.