(Newswire.net — May 26, 2018) — Both the tech world and the automobile industry have been raving about the self-driving car for the past few months. The forerunners of the technology include big companies such as Tesla and Google, both of which are some of the biggest companies in their respective fields, and both of which have their own iteration of the self-driving car.
First off, what is a self-driving car? Although the name itself is pretty self-explanatory, the self-driving car is more technically referred to as the “Autonomous Car” or “Driverless Car”. This vehicle is basically a car that requires no driver — or any human intervention at that — to successfully navigate through urban jungles and highways.
This feat is made possible through the interplay of different types of technology in order to make the car function properly. These technologies include an array of sensors, GPS locators, radar, artificial intelligence, and a number of cameras. The interaction between all these technologies is meant to give the car the ability to navigate and react to several types of situations that one would encounter on the road.
While all this sounds nifty, self-driving cars, like all types of technology, are prone to failure. And the premise here is that since self-driving cars rely on so many types of technologies that work together to function the way it was intended to, the risk of failure is significantly higher versus when only a single type of technology is involved.
In fact, the technology has already failed; what’s worse is that it was a fatal accident.
On March 18, 2018 in Tempe, Arizona, a pedestrian was killed when an experimental self-driving Uber hit her as she crossed the street. This video shows that the car made no attempt to stop, nor did it make any attempt to swerve. This was the first known fatal accident to involve a fully autonomous car.
Now, this begs the question: In the event of such an accident, who is to be held liable? The car? The car manufacturer? The passenger?
Normally, when building a legal argument, one simply has to follow the principle of stare decisis, which is to make of use of precedents (previous decisions by the courts on a given matter) in order to have a firm basis for your case. However, in this case, there are no precedents to be used yet because self-driving cars aren’t even publicly available, and there have been no previous cases relating to the matter.
Now in situations like this, where there are no precedents to build a case upon, one simply has to turn to the laws that rule the land. However, once again, because this concept is so new, there aren’t any laws that govern the use of self-driving cars (yet).
However, there are news reports that there are currently laws that are in the making that seek to address the issues brought about by the use of fully autonomous cars. Until then, it’s difficult to say who exactly is liable in the case of an accident. So, while the answer to the question of “who is to be held liable” remains unknown, what is known is that you’ll need the help of good personal injury lawyers if you want to file a compensation claim. The lawyers at Sarkisian Law in Valparaiso, Indiana should be on your shortlist if that’s the case.