Uber driverless car in fatal accident

[Kawasicki]

havoc said:

The Selfish Gene said:

akirk said:

We need to stop this apologist explanation saying that the human driver could have done very little about it... they absolutely could have avoided it...
Someone died - it is a pretty major negative outcome - there is lots that could have been done to prevent it...
- the driver is still meant to be ultimately responsible - they should have been paying attention
- the driver should have picked up that the lights were not showing enough road for the speed, and taken back control
- the driver should then have braked and avoided killing the pedestrian

instead, the driver let the car make all the choices, including bad choices...
they should be preventing the car from entering a situation where they no longer have time to react... otherwise their role is invalid / pointless

i.e. the driver should have avoided the situation starting - which would have avoided the outcome
we should not be accepting media and others saying - they could do nothing about it because they didn't have time to react - it was their job to only drive in such a way that they would have time to react!

bingo

Blind trust in unproven technology isn't enough. Not by a long shot.

In addition:-
- The car SHOULD have had something like LIDAR/RADAR to pick this up, or even some sort of low-light vision system. BLIND reliance on visible light is piss-poor quite frankly. Be very interested to know whether any of the above was fitted, and why it failed.
- There SHOULD (probably won't be / can't be without true AI) some way of picking up on the subtle clues that an attentive driver would use to highlight potential hazards before they 'jump out' (literally), e.g.
- Signs of kids playing nearby. Toys on the ground / playground across the road / even feet visible under cars
- Indications of animals nearby - parks, unfenced farmland, etc.
- Indications of side-roads joining ahead, e.g. hedgerow/treeling convergence, or even driveways/farm tracks which wouldn't be on any inbuilt map
- Seeing a pub ahead when you're driving around kicking-out time
etc. etc...


Human beings are capable of reacting to all manner of subtle / subconscious inputs that a computer most probably cannot. Not saying every driver does, but even a modestly-competent driver would pick up on environmental cues about the appropriate speed.

Computers are dumb. Either you use amazing sensors and data sharing between vehicles to get around that or you build a computer with as much sense and perception as the driver you intend to replace.

Amazing sensors and data sharing has potential, amazing AI is a long way off. By the time AI is good enough to replace a moderately competent driver we will have much bigger things to enjoy/fear than self driving cars!

[RobDickinson]

I think we need to understand the video has been processed the codec quite poor and the dark shadow areas crushed.

I think the lady would have been visible a fair amount before you see her in the video.

I'm any similar real world situation I'm pretty sure I'd have spotted them in plenty of time and avoided them.

The lidar equipped car has no excuse.

[Vanden Saab]

RobDickinson said:

I think we need to understand the video has been processed the codec quite poor and the dark shadow areas crushed.

I think the lady would have been visible a fair amount before you see her in the video.

I'm any similar real world situation I'm pretty sure I'd have spotted them in plenty of time and avoided them.

The lidar equipped car has no excuse.

Are you suggesting that uber did that on purpose to make it look like the accident was unavoidable?

[RobDickinson]

I wasn't no, it's just a combination of typical lowish end digital sensor and low bitrate compression. These cameras I doubt are any part of the cars self driving systems.

But now you mention it...

[Kawasicki]

RobDickinson said:

I think we need to understand the video has been processed the codec quite poor and the dark shadow areas crushed.

I think the lady would have been visible a fair amount before you see her in the video.

I'm any similar real world situation I'm pretty sure I'd have spotted them in plenty of time and avoided them.

The lidar equipped car has no excuse.

Maybe the lidar is just not very good.

[RobDickinson]

No reason why it shouldn't be good it's a high end system plus backed up by radar multiple cameras etc..

https://techcrunch.com/2018/03/19/heres-how-ubers-...

[Vanden Saab]

I only asked because of what blaster said below... And yet it seems the only video is poor quality and makes it look like the accident was unavoidable call me an old cynic if you like...

Blaster72 said:

NTSB are saying pedestrian.

https://www.ntsb.gov/news/press-releases/Pages/NR2...

Perhaps she was pushing her bicycle across the road, maybe not. At least the Uber car will have plenty of cameras and footage to help investigate the cause.

[TooMany2cvs]

Vanden Saab said:

And yet it seems the only video is poor quality

Perhaps the linked video is not full original quality, having been (badly) downsampled at some point while being released?

[Kawasicki]

RobDickinson said:

No reason why it shouldn't be good it's a high end system plus backed up by radar multiple cameras etc..

https://techcrunch.com/2018/03/19/heres-how-ubers-...

The article at TechCrunch doesn’t mention it being a high end sensor, it could also be a cheap, completely crap, unreliable sensor.

[BugLebowski]

DonkeyApple said:

Seeing as Uber is a fundamentally dishonest company which routinely displays its low moral standards, is there a suggestion yet that their evidence isn’t a pure as it might otherwise be then?

I looks like basic footage from a low quality dash cam with poor dynamic range. Something similar to this video It is no way representative of human vision at night.

Does Uber have a crappy dash cam on it's £50k+ SUV or has it been poorly processed? Looking at this article it would seem that there are several high quality cameras present. So maybe there is better quality footage out there that hasn't been released?

I think it is particularly embarrassing for the Tempe police chief who was very quick to say that the crash was unavoidable.

[Vanden Saab]

Interesting video on ubers atg site regarding what their backup drivers are trained to do. I am totally convinced that they will blame the driver now.
Can't link video because old luddite.....
https://www.uber.com/info/atg/

[Kawasicki]

BugLebowski said:

I looks like basic footage from a low quality dash cam with poor dynamic range. Something similar to this video It is no way representative of human vision at night.

Does Uber have a crappy dash cam on it's £50k+ SUV or has it been poorly processed? Looking at this article it would seem that there are several high quality cameras present. So maybe there is better quality footage out there that hasn't been released?

I think it is particularly embarrassing for the Tempe police chief who was very quick to say that the crash was unavoidable.

Again, that TechCrunch article doesn’t mention anything about the quality of the cameras used. They might be poor dash cam quality.

[rxe]

It does illustrate an interesting problem.

A lot of the US commentary focuses on the fact that the pedestrian wasn't on a crossing. Uber's defence will probably settle on that, and get away with it. So we will have driverless car technology developed in the US that is completely unsuitable for the UK. If you restrict peds to crossings, then driverless is much easier from a software POV.

I also wonder if elements of the tech simply weren't working that night. Given the miles these things have covered, you'd have thought it would have happened before now if the tech really was that rubbish. This is another issue - if the lidar (or any other of the hundreds of sensors) fails, then the car has to stop. Perhaps this one was still driving but with a bad sensor.

Edited by rxe on Thursday 22 March 20:04

[AreOut]

rxe said:

It does illustrate an interesting problem.

A lot of the US commentary focuses on the fact that the pedestrian wasn't on a crossing. Uber's defence will probably settle on that, and get away with it.

I don't think so, if you drive over speed limit and fail to react not paying any attention you are guilty as well regardless of the other party. The accident could be avoided if the car was driven according to law and that's all the lawyers need to sue them and win without doubt.

[TTmonkey]

rxe said:

It does illustrate an interesting problem.

A lot of the US commentary focuses on the fact that the pedestrian wasn't on a crossing. Uber's defence will probably settle on that, and get away with it. So we will have driverless car technology developed in the US that is completely unsuitable for the UK. If you restrict peds to crossings, then driverless is much easier from a software POV.

Edited by rxe on Thursday 22 March 20:04

I think this is important. USA has strict rules on pedestrians on the road, and using crossings. There's no such rules in this country. And there's far more people around than in Arizona, where the road layout is much different from here. I can't see how this tech gets cleared for use there and applies here with a seamless transition between the two.

But I do think that once the likes of Uber have had to pay out millions in comp to people bring run over by their cars, people will be throwing themselves at the cars.

[peterperkins]

TTmonkey said:

But I do think that once the likes of Uber have had to pay out millions in comp to people being run over by their cars, people will be throwing themselves at the cars.

Interesting point and probably spot on. Like crash for cash..
So they will certainly get quite a lot of live real world testing shortly.

[Fastpedeller]

I find it difficult to understand how the Chief of Police has stated the car wasn't to blame - How much is he being paid by Volvo or Uber? Is it reasonable that he even makes such a statement? Victim blaming is easy when the victim is deceased. RIP.

[anonymous-user]

Fastpedeller said:

I find it difficult to understand how the Chief of Police has stated the car wasn't to blame - How much is he being paid by Volvo or Uber?

I understand he came to the conclusion after viewing the dashcam video. I don't think any other evidence has been reviewed yet?

As I posted earlier, my thoughts after watching the same video were pretty much "Wow. That was unavoidable. She ran right out in front of the car and you couldn't see her until the last second".

From watching the video, it's easy to see why he promptly came to the conclusion he did, which is that the car and driver stood absolutely no chance of braking or swerving in time.

There have been developments since then, such as a new video emerging showing the road was much better lit than it appears on the dash cam video, raising questions such as why didn't the driver see the pedestrian?

I don't actually think it will be as much of an open and shut case as the police chiefs inital statement suggests.

[Blaster72]

Fastpedeller said:

I find it difficult to understand how the Chief of Police has stated the car wasn't to blame - How much is he being paid by Volvo or Uber? Is it reasonable that he even makes such a statement? Victim blaming is easy when the victim is deceased. RIP.

The Police Chief will be hired by the city, the city has relaxed laws allowing Uber to do live testing among its citizens bringing in cash to the city - ergo Police Chief may be ever so slightly biased possibly.

[speedking31]

The Chief of Police is female.