Uber Halts Autonomous-Car Testing After Fatal Arizona Crash
Uber Halts Autonomous-Car Testing After Fatal Arizona
Crash
First known pedestrian death involving a self-driving
vehicle
Incident may raise questions about safety of technology
By Mark Bergen and Eric Newsomer March 19, 2018, 9:56 AM
PDT Updated on March 19, 2018, 11:51 AM PDT
A self-driving car from Uber Technologies hit and killed
a woman in Arizona on Sunday night.
Uber Technologies Inc. halted autonomous vehicle tests
after one of its cars struck and killed a woman in Tempe, Arizona, in what is
likely the first pedestrian fatality involving the technology.
The 49-year-old woman, Elaine Herzberg, was crossing the
road outside of a crosswalk when the Uber vehicle operating in autonomous mode
under the supervision of a human safety driver struck her, according to the
Tempe Police Department.
After the incident, which happened at 10 p.m. local time
on Sunday, she was transferred to a nearby hospital, where she died from her
injuries. "Uber is assisting and this is still an active
investigation," Liliana Duran, a Tempe police spokeswoman, said in an
emailed statement.
Uber said on Monday that it was pausing tests of all its
self-driving vehicles on public roads in Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Toronto and
the greater Phoenix area. “Our hearts go out to the victim’s family," a
company spokeswoman said in a statement. "We are fully cooperating with local
authorities in their investigation of this incident."
Companies including Alphabet Inc., General Motors Co.,
Uber and Baidu Inc. are investing billions of dollars to develop
autonomous-vehicle technology because it has the potential to transform the
auto industry, transportation in general and the way cities work. One analyst
has estimated Alphabet’s Waymo unit is worth at least $70 billion. The fatality
in Tempe could slow testing, delay commercialization and undermine such
optimism.
Testing has expanded to complex urban areas as states
like Arizona and Texas take a light-touch regulatory approach and companies
race to be first to commercialize the technology. That’s helped improved the
systems, but also increased the chance of a pedestrian death. Experts have long
worried about the impact deadly crashes could have on the nascent industry.
"We’re within the phase of autonomous vehicles where
we’re still learning how good they are. Whenever you release a new technology
there’s a whole bunch of unanticipated situations," said Arun
Sundararajan, a professor at New York University’s business school.
"Despite the fact that humans are also prone to error, we have as a
society many decades of understanding of those errors."
The National Transportation Safety Board is opening an
investigation into the death and is sending a small team of investigators to
Tempe, about 10 miles east of Phoenix. The Department of Transportation’s
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration dispatched a special crash
investigation team.
The NTSB opens relatively few highway accident probes
each year, but has been closely following incidents involving autonomous or
partially autonomous vehicles. Last year, it partially faulted Tesla Inc.’s
Autopilot system for a fatal crash in Florida in 2016.
The NTSB’s cautionary tone on the emergence of
self-driving technology contrasted with the Department of Transportation, which
revised its policy on self-driving vehicles Tuesday in an attempt to remove
obstacles to the testing of such vehicles.
"As always we want the facts, but based on what is
being reported this is exactly what we have been concerned about and what could
happen if you test self-driving vehicles on city streets," said Jason
Levine, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a Washington-based
advocacy group. "It will set consumer confidence in the technology back
years if not decades. We need to slow down."
The Phoenix area is a fertile ground for experiments in
the technology. Uber has been testing there with safety drivers behind the
wheel. Late last year, Alphabet Inc.’s Waymo, which has tested in the Phoenix
area for years, began removing the safety drivers to transport a small number
of residents. (Waymo staff sit in the back seat.) General Motors Co. is also
testing in the Phoenix area. A GM spokesman declined to comment, and a
representative from Waymo didn’t return multiple requests for comment.
For more on Uber, check out the Decrypted podcast:
"Public safety is our top priority, and we are in
communication with law enforcement, which is investigating the accident and
gathering facts, as well as Uber," a spokesman for Arizona Governor Doug
Ducey said.
Uber has had minor incidents in the past. A self-driving
Uber car ran a red light in San Francisco while the company operated in the
city without regulatory approval. The California Department of Motor Vehicles
eventually forced Uber to pull the cars from the road.
— With assistance by Alan Levin, Ryan Beene, and Polly
Mosendz
Comments
Post a Comment