Well, it finally happened. After 2.3 million kilometres of autonomous driving, Google has managed to crash one of its vehicles. It seems the incident occurred at low speed and involved a bus in the adjacent lane.

 

 

Here’s how the company described the bingle, with full details to be published in the coming days as part of their monthly report.

Our test driver, who had been watching the bus in the mirror, also expected the bus to slow or stop. And we can imagine the bus driver assumed we were going to stay put. Unfortunately, all these assumptions led us to the same spot in the lane at the same time. This type of misunderstanding happens between human drivers on the road every day.

This is a classic example of the negotiation that’s a normal part of driving — we’re all trying to predict each other’s movements. In this case, we clearly bear some responsibility, because if our car hadn’t moved there wouldn’t have been a collision. That said, our test driver believed the bus was going to slow or stop to allow us to merge into the traffic, and that there would be sufficient space to do that.

Still, that’s a pretty good run, and the fact that no one was injured might go some way to assuage those who are still terrified by the prospect of robotic cars.

 

 

Meanwhile, over at Tesla…

Keep in mind that Tesla has just released new software that brings a new service called ‘Summon’ to owners of the rather wonderful Model S. The 7.1.1 release allows drivers to exit the car in order for it to park and lock itself.

 

 

So far, that’s a pretty evolutionary step, however once you’re ready to leave, simple ‘summon’ the car via the phone app and the vehicle will exit its park use GPS to arrive where you are standing. The car can even negotiate garage doors via infrared remote control. 

That's a pretty substantial step, and is one that points the way to what Google is trying to achieve. 

[Google/Tesla/Gizmodo AU]