Uber driverless car in fatal accident

[stuttgartmetal]

If these Uber cars were speed limited to 10mph In residential street, the chances of a fatal accident would be infinitesimally small.
Plus. It doesn’t matter what they look like, theyre utensils.
They can be covered in airbags driven by micro sensors.
It’ll happen.

[Talksteer]

the tribester said:

It's not clear how the collision occurred, only that the lady was crossing the road and not using a crossing.

If she'd stepped out, or run out, from between two parked vehicles into the Ubers path, with another vehicle maybe alongside the Uber, what chance would a human driver or observer have?

I'd need a bit more detail before making my mind up.

The image of the aftermath shows that there was no parked cars.

Were I a betting man I'd suggest that the wheeled bike and night time are probably factors that might make the car's software unable to determine what it was looking at and thus not predict that the pedestrian was about to walk out.

[otolith]

Jasandjules said:

Now, who is liable in criminal law for this death?

If nobody (alive) was negligent, nobody.

[hutchst]

The whole concept is a minefield. Just a couple of related issues in yesterday's news. Self driving buses, in Sweden I think it was, stoppingbthemselves in the middle of the road when they sense steam rising from drain covers in cold weather. So do we all stay at home if it's a bit misty outside?

And more interesting the bloke in Australia going to court because he stripped the microchip out of a travel card and inserted it under his skin. If we all get one of those, will we programme the car software to decide whether it's worth bothering to take avoiding action at all? We could solve the millennial's problem of having too many old baby boomers on the electoral register with a quick overnight online firmware upgrade.

[hutchst]

otolith said:

If nobody (alive) was negligent, nobody.

And in civil law? It happened in America.

[kev1974]

Blaster72 said:

I wonder how long it'll be before the Uber PR machine rolls into action and tries to character assassinate the victim?

The Daily Mail sure hasn't wasted any time pointing out her drug charges and probation violations

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5519433/Se...

[JagLover]

kev1974 said:

The Daily Mail sure hasn't wasted any time pointing out her drug charges and probation violations

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5519433/Se...

Drugs charges might be relevant as to why someone might step out in front of a car?

[Russian Troll Bot]

RobDickinson said:

Literally no one had said self driving cars will be perfect.

Volvo has said it wants to eliminate all road deaths and serious injuries by 2020. Things better progress pretty quickly in the next 20 months.......

[peterperkins]

Let's say for argument by 2040 driverless cars reduce road deaths by 50%, is that ok?
People have been using the 'what if the one killed is my relative argument',
but what if they are one of the 50% that have been saved?

We won't hear about that, it will just be chalked up as a near miss or whatever by the software..
Statistics for areas that implement the new technology will easily show if there is a shift in casualty or accident patterns.

How many roads deaths is acceptable for us to retain control of our vehicles?
We all moan a bucketful when some innocent is killed by an idiot in a car.

Someone has died testing a self driving car, that's sad of course but it may have been unavoidable by any system.
At least there will be tons of data to analyse and improve on the software/AI.

Human drivers probably = at least a million deaths a year worldwide.
Autonomous vehicles might reduce that by 1 or 1000 or 900,000....

Don't get me wrong I like driving/cars but im not perfect and can make mistakes as can the rest of us..

The liability question is of course interesting and might take legislation to prevent class action suits crippling the industry before it has a chance to show long term benefits. People are naturally short sighted and emotionally attached when it's one of their own who has bought it in an accident. The greater good might be limited liability and money for research.

[DoubleD]

Vanden Saab said:

So corporate manslaughter will become an acceptable thing with a price tag in the courts, much as human error is now regarding car accidents. The standard line will be that The company will say they have reprogrammed the computer and it will not make this mistake again...You would be entirely comfortable with this line as while your wife/ daughter or mother died many other people will still be alive...

Would you prefer that they were killed by another human then?

[DonkeyApple]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/19...

Very sad. By all accounts the lady was walking with her bike when she was just wiped out be a vehicle traveling at. 40mph that simply never saw her.

That is a pretty catastrophic blind spot for a vehicle allowed to test on the public highway.

[4x4Tyke]

Rovinghawk said:

loafer123 said:

What is important is that they have less accidents than cars driven by humans.

That's probably not a high priority to the family of the deceased.

I imagine the same could be said for any accident involving a pedestrian, even when they cause it.

[Alucidnation]

That's happened twice now.

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

[juice]

Bit confused by this as by all accounts there was a driver on-board....How come he never intervened ?

[captainaverage]

juice said:

Bit confused by this as by all accounts there was a driver on-board....How come he never intervened ?

Maybe he was emailing/messaging other customers or some other bullocks most come up with to justify autonomous cars.

Sad for the lady but

-1 for the autonomous lovers squad tech junkies.

[HTP99]

I wonder where the blame lies and who is charged; person in the car, Uber, will it be a huge corporate blame, will some faceless director be thrown under the bus by Uber?

Could be a massive can of worms.

[anonymous-user]

Jasandjules said:

Now, who is liable in criminal law for this death?

Surely the driver/operator of the vehicle?

I view Autopilot and other autonomous systems the same as cruise control, in so far as there is still one human who is the party responsible for safe operation of the vehicle.

I suspect the courts will view it the same for a long time to come.

[mygoldfishbowl]

Sad indeed, but who would have guessed the first person killed by one of these things would be a cyclist.

[lyonspride]

Not a fan of autonomous self driving vehicles, BUT the media is going to jump on every incident that one is involved in, regardless of whether a human driver would have done no better.

[Eric Mc]

If a car is being operated autonomously, who is the "driver" from the legal point of view?

If a human has to be "in charge" at all times, what will the criteria be for "being in charge"?

And, if a human needs to be "in charge", what is the point of the vehicle being autonomous?

Will a person have to obtain a different type of driving licence if they only own an autonomous vehicle?