A Cruise autonomous taxi in San Francisco, California, US, on Aug 10, 2023. The collision with a firetruck raises questions about why the vehicle did not know to stop for an emergency vehicle, and why it did not notice through traffic while crossing an intersection. — Bloomberg
A Cruise robotaxi collided with a firetruck late Thursday in San Francisco, injuring the vehicle’s passenger.
The autonomous-driving company, a subsidiary of General Motors Co, reported the crash in a series of social media posts Friday.
“One of our cars entered the intersection on a green light and was struck by an emergency vehicle that appeared to be en route to an emergency scene,” the company posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. The accident occurred shortly after 10pm in the Tenderloin neighbourhood of San Francisco, Cruise said.
“Our car contained one passenger who was treated on scene and transported via ambulance for what we believe are non-severe injuries,” the company said.
The incident raises questions about why the vehicle did not know to stop for an emergency vehicle, and why it did not notice through traffic while crossing an intersection.
A video by San Francisco’s local ABC network showed the emergency vehicle was a firetruck. The San Francisco Fire Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.
Last week, California’s Public Utilities Commission voted 3 to 1 to allow Cruise and Alphabet Inc.’s Waymo to increase the areas of the city where they can operate autonomous vehicles without a safety driver, and charge riders a fare for it.
The city of San Francisco, led by City Attorney David Chiu, asked state regulators on Wednesday to pause their decision to grant Cruise and Waymo’s expansion.
“San Francisco will suffer serious harm if Cruise is allowed expansion in the City with no limitations on geographic area, service hours and fleet size,” the city wrote in its 84-page motion. “As the Commission has acknowledged, the performance of Cruise’s driverless AVs currently in limited deployment and testing has interfered with first responder operations, public transit, street construction workers, and the flow of traffic generally.”
Recent posts on social media have also shown some strange behaviour from Cruise’s driverless vehicles. One video posted Monday showed a car driving through a crosswalk even as children crossed, and another showed the Cruise vehicle stop in an intersection with cars behind it. – Bloomberg
