California Woman In Critical Condition After Hit-And-Run Throws Her Into Self-Driving Car’s Path

Forbes Business Breaking California Woman In Critical Condition After Hit-And-Run Throws Her Into Self-Driving Car’s Path Mary Whitfill Roeloffs Forbes Staff I am a Boston-based reporter covering breaking news. Following Oct 3, 2023, 03:29pm EDT | Press play to listen to this article! Got it! Updated Oct 3, 2023, 03:54pm EDT Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Topline A woman is in critical condition after a hit-and-run accident pushed her into the path of a self-driving car in San Francisco that trapped her underneath, multiple outlets reported Tuesday, the first serious injury involving one of the city’s autonomous cars. A Cruise, which is a driverless robotaxi, is seen during operation in San Francisco on July 24, .

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Anadolu Agency via Getty Images Key Facts The victim was walking across moving traffic at a green light when a human-driven car hit her and then fled the scene, throwing her into the path of a vehicle in the adjacent lane owned by Cruise, one of two self-driving car companies currently operating in San Francisco, police told NBC News. Representatives for Cruise posted on X that the self-driving vehicle “then braked aggressively to minimize the impact” and that the car was then “kept in place” on top of the woman at the request of police. The woman was taken to a hospital with “multiple traumatic injuries” Monday night after firefighters used hydraulic rescue tools, also known as the jaws of life, to lift the self-driving car off of her, the San Francisco Fire Department told ABC’s San Francisco affiliate .

At the time of the crash, the front of the Cruise car was about half a car length behind the front of the other car, NBC reported , and the “initial impact was severe,” Cruise said . Photos obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle show the woman stuck under the rear axle of the Cruise car, which had no passengers at the time of the crash. Cruise in a statement expressed its “heartfelt concern” for the victim and said it was “actively working with police to help identify the responsible driver.

” Key Background Police told the local ABC station the Monday night crash is the first they’ve seen involving serious injury with an autonomous car. Blame has yet to be placed in the crash and no charges have been filed. General Motors-owned Cruise and Google’s Waymo each operate fleets of robotaxis in San Francisco, though Cruise in August agreed to cut its fleet in the city by 50% after robotaxis were involved in several comparatively minor accidents.

A Cruise passenger was injured in a crash with a fire truck in August, which one firefighter said happened because the car didn’t yield to the emergency vehicle in an intersection. San Francisco Fire Department records obtained by Forbes also blame two Cruise vehicles for delaying help for someone involved in a serious crash in the same month. The person had been hit by another car and was bleeding profusely when an ambulance arrived to help, the records show, but two Cruise cars were blocking the emergency vehicle.

A police car had to move to clear the way for the ambulance to take off, which authorities said delayed medical care for the patient, who later died. Cruise denied its cars were the reason for the delay. Big Number 150.

That’s how many crashes Waymo reported to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration between July 2021 and July 2023. Cruise reported 78 in the same amount of time. Contra Cruise, which also has fleets in Phoenix and Austin, has defended its safety record numerous times since it first started testing its cars in the city in December 2020.

After the crash with the fire truck, Greg Dieterich, Cruise’s general manager in San Francisco, said the car was able to “almost immediately” identify the fire truck as it came into view and the siren “as soon as it was distinguishable from the background noise. ” He blamed the specific intersection and its tough sight lines for the crash, and said it’s a difficult place for “humans and AVs alike” to navigate. The company released its first safety report in November, and said it sends each car through a robust set of test scenarios through top-down designs, on-road driving data and industry standard collision avoidance scenarios.

” Tangent Most of the problems linked to driverless vehicles have been annoyances that didn’t lead to injury. One drove into wet concrete and got stuck on a construction site, and nearly a dozen froze in traffic after crowds at the Outside Lands Music Festival caused bandwidth problems. There have been multiple reports of cars shutting down and refusing to move when they encountered an unexpected issue like downed wires or fog , and the San Francisco Fire Department reported 55 incidents of problems caused by the cars between August and the start of the year, per the New York Times .

Surprising Fact A group of activists called Safe Street Rebels has started interfering with the cars in attempts to keep them off the streets. Members are placing traffic cones on the hoods of the cars to keep them from moving—the cones shut them down until a human employee comes along to fix it. Further Reading The Mystery Around A Robotaxi, The Fire Department And A Death In San Francisco ( Forbes ) Driverless Cars Face Setbacks In San Francisco—Here’s What To Know About The City’s Problematic Robotaxi Rollout ( Forbes ) 68% Of Americans Afraid Of Self-Driving Cars, Up From 55% In 2022 ( Forbes ) As Robotaxis Become More Common, So Might Sex In Them ( Forbes ) Reports Of The Death Of Self-Driving Cars Are Greatly Exaggerated ( Forbes ) Follow me on Twitter .

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