[Steverino]

Or hit the horn alarm? You'd think so, but a recent driveless bus in LA got whacked by a truck driver backing up and not paying attention. The bus saw the truck backing up and stopped. It could not back up and apparently did not sound it's horn. The truck driver soon backed into the bus.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/self-driving-bus-accident-day-las-vegas-article-1.3621441

 

[telveer]

Definitely a good requirement/feature for fully autonomous vehicles.

 

[Steverino]

Definitely a good requirement/feature for fully autonomous vehicles.

And one I (and apparently the bus company) had not thought about before now. What we see is auto-braking, perhaps turning. But horn honking and Reverse? Not in any current cars advertising some sort of auto pilot. None of the Bolt videos from GM's Cruise Automation has shown backing up behavior that I know of.

 

[El Dobro]

Maybe they'll start working on it after they hear what happened.

 

[Loboc]

None of the Bolt videos from GM's Cruise Automation has shown backing up behavior that I know of.

I thought they could parallel park.

I did see a video recently where they were testing AVs on a track with various obstacles. The testing was to see if they could get the AV to beat the human through the course. No backing up. Only forward collision avoidance mostly by steering around the danger.

 

[Barry]

That is the ultimate test for autonomous vehicles-- how to compensate for the errors of other drivers. I think it will take quite some time for them to get good at that. Thankfully in this case it resulted in only minor damage/no injury. It would be nice if data from these kinds of events could be captured and made available to all AV developers so we don't have to make the same mistakes multiple times.

 

[Steverino]

With all the camera's and LIDAR looking to the side (and rear?), you'd think SHABHU (Sound the Horn and Back the Hell Up) would be a response mode, especially when you see the object in front approaching you while you are stopped.

 

[Upper5Percent]

Or hit the horn alarm? You'd think so, but a recent driveless bus in LA got whacked by a truck driver backing up and not paying attention. The bus saw the truck backing up and stopped. It could not back up and apparently did not sound it's horn. The truck driver soon backed into the bus.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/self-driving-bus-accident-day-las-vegas-article-1.3621441

If the autonomous vehicle were to have switched into reverse and then was rear-ended...I can guarantee the hitter would have claimed the automous vehicle backed in to him...because a vehicle in reverse on the highway is now the burdened vehicle in a crash...

 

[Steverino]

If the autonomous vehicle were to have switched into reverse and then was rear-ended...I can guarantee the hitter would have claimed the automous vehicle backed in to him...because a vehicle in reverse on the highway is now the burdened vehicle in a crash...

Sure, but if there is no other car, no problem. And if there was a vehicle approaching, the AV would stop depending on how far away the other car was and it's speed.

 

[edk-austin]

Not that humans would always do better. My wife once panicked in a rental car as a Semi trailer backed into her. Fortunately, the semi driver felt the impact and stopped, not much damage. It did have a Mansfield Bar, but it also had a loading ramp door on the back that did most of the damage to the car (Ford Escape) hood. Fortunately the truck driver also 'fessed up to the police officer that he was backing up (in a very busy controlled intersection no less).

I took the attached picture seconds After it happened from the passenger seat. Traffic is moving forward through the just turned green lights. Yeah, I was yelling back up, back up!

 

[hellsop]

If the autonomous vehicle were to have switched into reverse and then was rear-ended...I can guarantee the hitter would have claimed the automous vehicle backed in to him...because a vehicle in reverse on the highway is now the burdened vehicle in a crash...

Whereupon the owner of the AV would simply say "I'll see you in court with my vehicle's telemetry and logs."

THAT level of detail is gonna be a MASSIVE cultural changer. That many cars with lidar logging of every moving vehicle in perception range is gonna be a boon to sorting out collisions and fault.