When Google revealed to Americans that it had been quietly testing fully automated cars on public roads, some safety advocates raised concerns over the experiments. But it looks like the first crash involving one of the prototypes occurred while it was under human control.
This week one of the robot-controlled Prii was involved in a fender-bender, but there are some conflicting reports — Google claims two cars were involved, while at least one witness claims five were damaged.
According to a witness who was involved in the accident, Google’s automated Prius came to a screeching halt and rear-ended another Prius, which catapulted into a Honda Accord driven by the witness’ brother. The witness, who spoke with NBC’s Bay Area, said the Accord was pushed forward into a another Accord, which then struck a third Prius. That’s a total of two Accords and three Prii involved in the accident.
By contrast, Google’s official statement claims only the first two cars were involved. Furthermore, Google was quick to emphasize that the car was being piloted by the human driver, not the computer software at the time. If that’s the case, Google’s automated driving technology is still accident-free over the course of 160,000 total miles of travel.
References
1.’Google blames human…’ view
