SoylentNews

takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

A Google self-driving car may be at fault for a crash for the first time [theverge.com], although the damage was minimal:

Google has prided itself on the fact that its self-driving car fleet has never been responsible for any of its crashes — they've always been caused by another (decidedly more human) force — but that may have just changed. According to a California DMV filing first reported by writer Mark Harris [twitter.com], one of Google's self-driving Lexus SUVs drove into the side of a bus at low speed.

[...]

The Google AV test driver saw the bus approaching in the left side mirror but believed the bus would stop or slow to allow the Google AV to continue. Approximately three seconds later, as the Google AV was reentering the center of the lane it made contact with the side of the bus. The Google AV was operating in autonomous mode and traveling at less than 2 mph, and the bus was travelling at about 15 mph at the time of contact.

[...] In all likelihood, it was just a matter of time before one of these research cars hit something — there's still years of testing and development left to do, after all. Still, despite that and the fact that these cars are enormously safer than human drivers by any statistical measure, it could shake confidence that autonomous cars are close to ready for real-world use. Google's monthly self-driving report is due in just a couple days' time, so we'll likely get more details on the incident then. We've reached out to Google for comment.

California DMV report [ca.gov], and Reuters [reuters.com].

Original Submission