It’s not a matter of if self-driving cars will become the norm but when and with Google testing self-driving cars for the last six-years that day is getting closer and closer.
On a web post written by Director of Google’s self-driving project Chris Urmson he wrote "since testing begun the self-driving cars have been involved in 11 minor traffic accidents." According to his post all of the accidents involved human error and nothing to do with the self driving tech.
"If you spend enough time on the road, accidents will happen whether you’re in a car or a self-driving car. Over the 6 years since we started the project, we’ve been involved in 11 minor accidents (light damage, no injuries) during those 1.7 million miles of autonomous and manual driving with our safety drivers behind the wheel, and not once was the self-driving car the cause of the accident.”
Google use a fleet of Lexus RX SUVs that they have converted to allow them to test their self-driving technology. The 11 accidents include being hit from the rear 7 times, side swiped a couple of times and hit by a car going through a stop sign.
“Not once was the self-driving car the cause of the accident,” Chris Urmson wrote.
Click here to read the full article that was post by Chris Urmson on backchannel.
