California Personal Injury Lawyers Blog
Did you know that each year about 35,000 people die in car accidents in the United States? And worldwide, over 1,250,000 people perish in motor vehicle collisions each year! Did you also know that more people in the United States have died from car accidents than in wars?
Is there a solution?
Many believe that self driving or autonomous vehicles will cut down on car and other motor vehicle accidents and eventually eliminate most if not all such accidents with their resulting deaths, injuries and property damage.
CNN Tech reported that autonomous cars and other vehicles equipped with sensors and cameras with 360-degree vision have the capability to predict, perceive and react to whatever happens on the road and to do so even faster than any human driver. Such vehicles can sense a pedestrian crossing the street and stop; and adjust speed when nearby cars and other vehicles are slowing. Further, they are NOT distracted when a driver texts, as so often occurs now!
The immediate goal is not 100% safety. Driverless cars are not 100% safe. For example, in November of 2017, a self driving car from the French autonomous car company Navya crashed on its very first day out. Also, a self-driving Uber SUV flipped on its side in Arizona in March of 2017. Currently, there is one death for about every 100 million miles driven in the United States. So one goal is simply to beat that statistic. But is that safe enough?
Further, while driving in moderate city traffic is one thing, how will driverless cars do in heavy snow and rain storms? Tests are on going, including in Phoenix, Arizona and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with its varied seasons. Waymo claims its self driving vehicles have traveled more than 2.5 billion miles of simulated driving during the last year alone. While such driverless vehicles won’t get distracted like drivers do while texting or doing other things while driving, it is clear autonomous cars and other vehicles are not yet 100% safe and may never be completely safe until, at a minimum, all vehicles are autonomous and inter-linked. That day is clearly not yet around the corner.
Should you or a loved one suffer any injury or a relative a wrongful death as a result of a driverless car or other vehicle, please contact our California personal injury attorneys right away for a FREE consultation. Immediate investigation is often helpful to proving what really happened and who is at fault.