A BMW test car that was electric and partially autonomous swerved into oncoming traffic in Germany, causing a sequence of crashes involving four cars, resulting in one fatality and nine severe injuries.
On Monday in the southern town of Reutlingen, an electric BMW iX with five occupants—including an 18-month-old child—swerved out of its lane and almost collided with an approaching Citroen.
A 33-year-old lady was killed in the Mercedes-Benz van when the BMW, which costs at least £77,300, collided with it head-on.
In the meanwhile, the Citroen’s 70-year-old driver lost control of her vehicle and slammed into another vehicle carrying two passengers, knocking it off the road and causing it to catch fire.
Police investigating the collision originally said that an autonomous test car was involved and that it was not obvious if the 43-year-old BMW driver was actively directing the vehicle at the time of the collision or whether it was moving autonomously.
Later, BMW acknowledged that one of its test cars was involved, but it refuted claims that the car was totally driverless.
The company said that the car has Level 2 driver assistance technologies, which means that “the driver always remains accountable.” According to the BMW website, such systems may accelerate, stop automatically, and, unlike Level 1 systems, take over steering.
The automaker said it was in constant communication with the law enforcement to determine the precise facts surrounding the collision.
Four rescue helicopters were used in the medical response, according to Reutlingen police spokesperson Michael Schaal, and the wounded were brought to a number of hospitals in the area.
Three people, ages 31, 42, and 47, an 18-month-old infant, and the 43-year-old BMW driver were all in the test car.
Police have not yet had a chance to speak with people involved in the collision, according to Schaal.
According to a statement from the police, “the collision vehicle was an autonomous electric test car.” “Whether or whether the 43-year-old (driver) was steering it is the topic of inquiry,” the statement said.
BMW disputed that the test car was completely autonomous, although it did acknowledge that one of its test vehicles was involved in a crash close to Reutlingen.
BMW noted that since the car was capturing video, it had to be identified as a test vehicle for data protection reasons.
According to BMW, “We are now looking into the specifics of the collision.” We are in regular communication with the authorities, of course.
In recent years, there have been many accidents with autonomous vehicles.
Elaine Herzberg, 49, was murdered in 2018 when one of Uber’s Volvo test vehicles hit and ran over her as she crossed a darkened street outside of a crosswalk in Tempe, Arizona.
The backup Uber driver in the self-driving Volvo SUV was allegedly watching “The Voice” on her phone and looked down just before the collision.
According to the National Transportation Safety Board, the Volvo’s autonomous driving system saw Herzberg approximately six seconds before colliding with her but did not brake because the feature that normally applies brakes automatically in potentially hazardous circumstances had been deactivated.
Additionally, the Volvo emergency braking system had been disabled.
US officials said in July that they were looking into the death of a lady who was killed by a Tesla driven by a 39-year-old man who was allegedly high on drugs and using Autopilot when the vehicle apparently flew off the road and struck her.
In connection with the event, a 39-year-old man was accused with vehicular manslaughter and drugged driving.
Frank Shoaf, who is thought to have been high from inhaling household materials while driving on Othello Avenue at approximately 8.30 am, is thought to have been involved in the incident.
He confessed to running a red light, hitting a dip, and going two feet into the air before hitting Cassandra May, 40.
Since 2016, the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has launched more than 35 special collision investigations involving Tesla cars in which the employment of cutting-edge driver assistance technologies like Autopilot was suspected.
In Florida earlier this year, a tractor-trailer rear-ended the Tesla, killing the 66-year-old driver and the 67-year-old passenger.
The NHTSA routinely launches more than 100 special accident investigations each year on new technology and other possible car safety problems, which have in the past, for example, assisted in the development of air bag safety regulations.
According to a police complaint from the Florida Highway Patrol, a 2015 Tesla rear-ended a tractor-trailer in the Gainesville vicinity at a rest stop off Interstate 75.
At the site, both occupants of the Tesla were confirmed as deceased.
Joshua D. Brown, 40, of Canton, Ohio, died in Florida on May 7, 2016, when the Tesla Model S’s cameras were unable to discern the right white side of a turning tractor-trailer from a brilliantly illuminated sky.
Walter Huang, an Apple software developer, was killed on March 23, 2018, in Mountain View, California, in a collision on U.S. Highway 101 while his Tesla’s Autopilot was on.
Federal officials discovered that the car reached 71 mph only seconds before colliding with a highway barrier.
The Model X SUV did not stop or attempt to steer around the barrier in the three seconds before to the disaster in Silicon Valley, according to data, the NTSB stated in a preliminary report on the collision.
Jeremy Banner, 50, lost his life on March 1, 2019, in Delray, Florida, after his 2018 Tesla Model 3 collided with a semi-truck.
At 68 mph, Banner’s automobile slammed beneath the truck, tearing off its roof in the process. At the scene, the married father-of-death three’s was confirmed.
According to NTSB investigators, Banner activated the autopilot function approximately 10 seconds before to the collision, but the autopilot made no evasive attempts to prevent the collision.
Meanwhile, on April 17 of last year in Houston, Texas, a Tesla crashed into a tree and caught fire, killing two men: the driver, Doctor William Varner, and his friend, Everette Talbot.
According to police, no one was driving when the collision occurred in Houston’s The Woodlands neighbourhood.
Tesla, however, had disputed the police’s assertions, claiming that the steering wheel’s deformity revealed that someone was probably in the driver’s seat.
When the Tesla Model S, which had been purchased used off of eBay in January, crashed into a tree and caught fire, Varner, 59, and Talbot, 69, both perished.
Steven Michael Hendrickson, 35, was murdered on May 5, 2021 in Los Angeles, California after his white Tesla Model 3 collided with an overturned semi-truck at about 2.30am on that day.
The married father of two shared social media footage of himself driving the electric car without using the steering wheel or gas pedal before to his passing.
On one of his Instagram videos, he was seen driving the Tesla while sitting in the driver’s seat, with neither hands on the wheel nor foot on the pedal.
“Best carpool friend conceivable even takes the boring traffic for me,” was said in the video.
About 50 miles east of Los Angeles, on the 210 Freeway, close to Fontana, a collision occurred.
According to a preliminary inquiry, the Tesla’s Autopilot partly autonomous driving technology “was active” just before the collision.
A representative said that no definitive answer had been found about the precise reason of the tragic collision, which was the 29th involving a Tesla that the government agency the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration had looked into.
A highway police investigation states that the Mack truck that the Tesla struck with had crashed and flipped only five minutes before, obstructing two lanes of the roadway.