A video not too long ago posted on-line reveals what occurs when police attempt to apprehend an autonomous car – solely to search out no person inside.
Police in San Francisco stopped a car operated by Cruise, an autonomous automotive firm backed by Normal Motors, in a video posted on 1 April. Officers approached the automotive, which had been driving with out headlights, solely to search out it was empty.
“Ain’t no person in it – that is loopy,” a bystander may be heard saying within the video. The automotive then speeds away to the opposite facet of the intersection, leaving the police behind.
The video, which has since circulated extensively on social media, prompted inevitable jokes. “Welcome to the longer term,” quipped one Twitter consumer.
Cruise is working to deploy its autonomous driving know-how for ride-hailing functions, transporting riders across the metropolis and not using a driver. It has been testing its autos with a backup driver within the entrance seat since 2015, however it began permitting customers to hail driverless vehicles in San Francisco in November 2021.
The corporate mentioned in a tweet that the car had behaved as anticipated by shifting to a safer location on the opposite facet of the intersection the place police had been in a position to deal with their considerations.
“Our AV yielded to the police car, then pulled over to the closest secure location, as meant. An officer contacted Cruise personnel and no quotation was issued,” Cruise mentioned on its company Twitter account.
A Cruise spokeswoman, Tiffany Testo, instructed the Guardian that the car “didn’t have its headlights on due to a human error, which was the rationale the SFPD approached it, and we’ve got fastened the difficulty that led to this”. She added that the corporate provided a telephone quantity for police to name with questions any time a car is pulled over. The SFPD didn’t instantly reply to request for remark in regards to the incident or about its insurance policies for driverless autos.
The viral video underscores the bumps within the highway as firms race to place totally autonomous autos on streets.
The Cruise video comes simply weeks after Waymo, one other autonomous automotive firm, introduced it will deploy driverless autos in San Francisco. Waymo has been engaged on autonomous driving know-how for greater than a decade and operating totally driverless rides in Arizona for greater than a yr.
However driverless automotive glitches have made headlines up to now, together with a Waymo car that turned caught at an intersection and required rescue.
Waymo mentioned in March it will enable passengers in its driverless vehicles on a trial foundation. To partake, riders should apply for a waitlist and signal non-disclosure agreements to get early entry.
Nuro, one other autonomous automotive firm, additionally has a allow for driverless autos in San Francisco, however is utilizing it for self-driving supply providers fairly than passenger rides. It’s already making driverless deliveries in Mountain View, California.
Different driverless automotive companies are engaged on their very own know-how, together with Elon Musk’s digital automotive firm Tesla and Aurora Innovation, an organization based mostly in Pittsburgh.
