Uber self-driving car death ’caused by software that chose to IGNORE pedestrian’
New reports have indicated the driverless car that killed a 49-year-old woman earlier this year actually saw the pedestrian before the crash
UBER'S self-driving car that killed a pedestrian may have seen the woman and ignored her anyway.
According to company insiders, the ride hailing app allegedly believes the fatal collision was due to a software fault that chose to dismiss the detection.
Tech website reported Uber sources had claimed 49-year-old victim Elaine Herzberg was seen by the car before the collision, but software declared it a "false positive" and failed to react.
According to reports, due to the way the software had been "tuned" the car misread the detection as something it did not need to react to when the pedestrian walked into the road.
Driverless software is programmed to ignore things that do not pose a threat, such as a balloon or plastic bag floating in front of the car.
But the technology is supposed to react to real dangers like pedestrians, other cars or a wall.
Uber declined to comment on the reports, but released a statement about the ongoing investigation.
It said: “We’re actively cooperating with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in their investigation.
“Out of respect for that process and the trust we’ve built with NTSB, we can’t comment on the specifics of the incident.
"In the meantime, we have initiated a top-to-bottom safety review of our self-driving vehicles program, and we have brought on former NTSB Chair Christopher Hart to advise us on our overall safety culture.
"Our review is looking at everything from the safety of our system to our training processes for vehicle operators, and we hope to have more to say soon.”
The new information comes just over a month after experts claimed the collision could have been avoided.
Despite the police chief of Tempe, Arizona saying there was little the safety driver of the car could have done to intervene, autonomous driving experts were convinced the car could've done more to avoid the collision.
Cortica, a company that develops artificial intelligence for self-driving cars, analysed the shocking dash cam footage of the incident.
More news on driverless cars
They said its system detected Herzberg 0.9 seconds before impact when the car was about 50 feet away.
In a video of the crash released by police, the Uber vehicle appeared not to brake before it struck the woman.
The human driver at the wheel appeared to be looking down and not at the road, suddenly looking shocked just before the collision.