In the recent crash where a pedestrian was hit and killed by an Uber self-driving vehicle over the weekend, Tempe police chief has told the San Francisco Chronicle that the self-driving car may not be at fault here. In accounts reported as well as receiving statements from around, a woman was pushing her bicycle across the road where the bicycle was laden with plastic bags.
In the report, it said that the driver couldn’t react to it and that the only collision warning sound he received was the sound of the actual collision. The self-driving car was traveling at 38mph (around 61kmh) at the time of the crash and the area was a 35mph zone.
The Uber self-driving car which was a Volvo SUV had two video cameras functioning at the time. Based on preliminary investigations by viewing the video evidence, Sylvia Moir the police chief of Tempe said that in this situation, it would have been very difficult to avoid this situation, regardless if it were a self-driving car or a human behind the wheel.
The police department at Tempe will be assisting the National Transportation Board in the US in their investigations into this crash. The outcome of this investigation would definitely be a key turning point for autonomous vehicles.
