Would Driverless Vehicles Stop for Accidents?

I think that’s a joke, but obviously “calling for help” still isn’t as good as “immediate, possibly life-saving aid from people who are already at the scene of the accident.”

Human in-the-loop.

For now.

2 Likes

English speaking countries - hardly any. There are a few US states that do - but I gather they are pretty much ignored by everyone.

English speaking countries make up quite a small part of the globe though. :slight_smile:

Germany does have a duty to rescue. So do lots of other mainland European countries. The Wikipedia article lists quite a few.

I can really only speak as to Germany. The law there is not that onerous. Basically if you see an accident or similar situation, you have a duty to provide such reasonable assistance as you can.

Basically, that amounts to calling the emergency services and maybe putting up some warning triangles. If you feel up to doing more, great. You’ll have some knowledge of first aid because it’s a requirement before getting your driving licence.

If you don’t feel up to doing more than calling the emergency services, you’re not going to get prosecuted. Calling the emergency services is about the minimum though unless you have a really good excuse as to why you couldn’t even do that.

At the end of the day, the law doesn’t require anyone to do more than ordinary basic human decency would, if there were such a thing.

If everyone is whizzing along reading their tablets or snoozing while the self-driving car makes all the decisions (which as I understand it is the end game), the car is going to have to decide what to do in those sort of situations though.

I doubt the car is going to be able to decide whether a situation calls for calling the emergency services itself well enough - bearing in mind that calling the emergency services without good reason is also an offence- so the car would presumably have to notify the passenger that something needed their attention.

That is the sort of question that you only really get in English speaking countries, or really only in America. You do like suing each other.

Even in common law countries the risk of being held liable for any injuries you cause in your efforts to help some one is minimal.

If you (not necessarily you-you) are worried about it, do a first aid course which includes insurance cover. I know St Johns Ambulance provide that in the UK. I don’t know about America.

In most countries that have a legal requirement to help, there is legal protection to cover you if you do and as I say the chance of being legally responsible for any damage you cause is minimal any way.

At the end of the day, if the accident victim was in bad enough shape that you needed to step in, very little you can do is going to make the situation significantly worse than not doing anything.

I know the common law has this quaint idea that not doing anything to help is legally safer than taking action but as far as actual human beings go, that’s a pretty crappy way to live one’s life.

Not everywhere thinks that way and if self-driving car makers want to sell outside the English-speaking world, they are either going to have to come with some system for dealing with accidents or get the rest of the world to change their laws.

I expect lots of lobbying to change the laws.

After all, we can’t have some silly laws getting the way of commerce, can we.

2 Likes

No, in the event of a crash, my Fiesta will call 911 for me. (Assuming that the car still works that much, my phone works, and that there’s cell coverage.)

It’s a much simpler problem if a vehicle in an accident can signal its distress electronically, through cell or local broadcast. That means passing vehicles don’t have to be worrying about that car for sale at the end of a country driveway, or the old wreck rusting into the field beside the road.

I think my Fiesta counts bums on seats for the airbags, so it could pass that along. (Also handy if there’s a homicidal trolley trying to decide who to kill.)

For pedestrians trying to flag down some help, perhaps some kind of electronic thumb?

1 Like

So this is the part that I find to be most interesting and notable. As things stand now, there is virtually no lawful obligation for a driver to stop their car or take any action, but most people do contact authorities or help on their own accord. In fact, I’ve never even had the chance to help an accident victim, because there have either been others already assisting, or they have assured me that help is already on the way. Do we really need every single car to asses, or worse stop at the site of an accident?

Why should driverless cars be subject to more responsibilty, or take control of that choice out of the passengers’ hands? People who aren’t driving are just as capable of seeing an accident and deciding what they want to do about it. The car doesn’t need to do or require anything of passengers-things already work on their own now.

1 Like

I don’t know whether they should. I think Akimbo_NOT’s original post brings up some interesting questions - I don’t have the answers.

As you say regardless of whether people are legally required to stop and help, most do (or at least -enough do - as you say it only takes one or two).

Where there are plenty of human occupied, if not driven, vehicles that might still be fine - although I do wonder what the eventual likelihood is that people would whizz past the accident, blissfully unaware of it.

Depending on where you are and what time it is the roads may be very empty. Just you and whatever caffeine crazed truckers happen to be barrelling along.

If all those trucks are driverless, no one might stop to help. No one would call for help - unless the truck does it. Is that a situation we’re happy with?

As far as whether we want to require every car to stop/assess the need to stop goes, I think that problem would be fairly easy to solve.

All cars get some sort of sat-nav/GPS signal anyway which amongst other things warns of blocked roads, tailbacks, etc. Once the first car has called in the accident, all the others in the area can be instructed to ignore it.

Can you take me as far as the roundabout at Barnard’s Star?

1 Like

If you read the whole thread I mentioned this a couple of times as what I considered to be the best option for cargo only vehicles.

My interest was in the discussion of what would be required of cars with people in them, if anything, as I said in the above reply, along with questions meant to further the same discussion. Maybe there isn’t much more to discuss at this point. :smiling_face:

1 Like

So many questions!

I hope that the good people working on these types of problems are considering all possibilities. They have opportunities to introduce effective life saving measures into autonomous vehicles. Unlike today’s unstoppable trains these vehicles will traverse roads that take them thru both heavily populated areas and sparsely populated areas where the chances are highly likely that they could make a difference whether or not somebody lives or dies.

Driverless vehicles are going to introduce many more questions and changes will ripple through many industries.

For example:

https://www.axios.com/what-happens-to-billboards-radio-when-cars-drive-themselves-2477002754.html

(Here’s hoping billboards disappear!)

2 Likes

Here’s my imperfect solution. Have a law requiring the autonomous vehicle to send an immediate report to emergency response dispatch. If the emergency response determines responders can’t be on the scene in time and letting the accident victim into the vehicles cargo hold would help the situation, and provided the vehicle isn’t carrying hazardous or dangerous cargo, then the dispatch should have the overriding authority to order the vehicle to return to the scene and open its cargo hold, and if necessary head toward the nearest medical help. At this point, the government should assume liability for any delays or possible trickery such as clever hijackers.

A driverless vehicle with passengers should always remain under the ultimate control of the passenger(s), though a mandatory automatic accident report from the vehicle’s sensor array might be in order.

ETA opportunistic Spaceball One reference…

3 Likes

Sorry, I can only take you as far as the Basingstoke roundabout. :wink:

2 Likes

This brought to mind another tangentially related question. When there are multiple passengers, who should have authority to order it to make the next safe stop? Right now it’s up to the driver for unavoidable reasons. But should passengers who aren’t owners or aren’t the individual hailing/paying for the self-driving ride be allowed to order it to stop and let them out? On the one hand, letting anyone order a stop could make kidnapping or coerced detention more difficult. On the other hand, almost every single kid would turn this into an opportunity to cause problems for their parents. Maybe it can be made so the car could be programmed to recognize and ignore stop orders from your kids or their playmates, and make the process laborious and time consuming enough that it wouldn’t be practical for kidnappers.

One thing is for certain. PhDs will be earned working out the ethics of self-driving vehicles.

4 Likes

“We Brake For Nobody”

AutonomousTrucks_Logan3

Hopefully not an accurate depiction of what is to come.

2 Likes

Good movie though.

1 Like

What the hell… why are there no cabs/tractors/whateveryoucallit pulling those?

1 Like

Robot trucks don’t need a place for a human to sit. Maybe they run on electric motors directly powering each axle?

2 Likes

Some will have human space:

Start at 01:33

1 Like

Do mermaids give birth to live young, or do they lay eggs? Asking for a friend.

1 Like

There’s also a difference between a driverless car, which still has passengers, and a driverless truck, which would not, and presumably therefore be of limited value.

EDIT - Ahh, addressed further up the thread.

1 Like

This topic was automatically closed 30 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.