NHTSA opened a preliminary investigation into Cruise autonomous vehicles after reports of inappropriate hard braking causing rear-end collisions and vehicles becoming immobilized on roadways, creating safety hazards.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) initiated a preliminary investigation into General Motors' Cruise autonomous vehicles operating as driverless taxis in San Francisco. The investigation covers 242 vehicles and focuses on two types of incidents. First, NHTSA received three reports where Cruise vehicles performed hard braking maneuvers when other vehicles approached quickly from behind, resulting in rear-end collisions in each case. Second, multiple reports described Cruise vehicles becoming immobilized on roadways while operating without human supervision, potentially stranding passengers in unsafe locations like travel lanes or intersections. These immobilized vehicles create unexpected obstacles for other road users, who may need to make abrupt maneuvers to avoid collisions, potentially diverting into oncoming traffic or bike lanes. The immobilizations also pose secondary safety risks by obstructing emergency response vehicles. No fatalities or serious injuries have been reported in Cruise vehicles, but NHTSA stated the incidents could put people at risk. Cruise has driven nearly 700,000 fully autonomous miles with zero life-threatening injuries or fatalities according to company statements.
Domain classification, causal taxonomy, severity scores, and national security assessments were LLM-classified and may contain errors.
AI systems that fail to perform reliably or effectively under varying conditions, exposing them to errors and failures that can have significant consequences, especially in critical applications or areas that require moral reasoning.
AI system
Due to a decision or action made by an AI system
Unintentional
Due to an unexpected outcome from pursuing a goal
Post-deployment
Occurring after the AI model has been trained and deployed