Report says Uber’s autonomous car saw the pedestrian but didn’t brake

Uber’s self-driving fatal car crash incident in Arizona has taken progress with a new report revealing that the car was aware of the pedestrian, but was not designed to automatically brake.

Report conducted by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) revealed that the incident, which occurred back in March, involved Uber’s self-driving car that took life of a pedestrian crossing the road. The report stated that the car was not functioned for emergency braking, resulting in accident.

The report suggests that the car has been in autonomous mode for around 19 minutes. The car’s onboard computer detected a pedestrian crossing the road about six seconds before the incident. At 1.3 seconds prior the crash, the car software determined that an emergency braking maneuver was necessary to mitigate the collision, reported Business Insider.

Uber shuts down its self-driving tests in Arizona after fatal crash

The car driver took action less than a second before impact by moving the steering wheel. At the time of the crash, the car was moving at a speed of 39mph and the operator didn’t begin braking until less than a second after the impact.

However, NTSB reported that Uber’s autonomous cars are not designed to automatically brake and rely on the operator to take emergency measures, and does not even alert the operator. It states that Uber’s reasoning for not automatically braking while under computer control is ‘to reduce the potential for erratic vehicle behavior,’ as per Ars Technica.

The involved vehicle was a modified Volvo XC90 SUV that features emergency breaking, but Uber automatically disabled these capabilities while its software was active. The driver can disengage from self-driving mode ‘by providing input to the steering wheel, brake pedal, accelerator pedal, a disengage button, or a disable button,’ the report continued.

The car contained interior cameras, forward and side facing camera, LIDAR, computing and data storage unit, radar, and navigation sensors. The cameras captured the incident that showed the pedestrian crossing the road. The interior cameras captured the car driver looking down at the center console several times before the crash, says the report, to which the operator told that she was monitor the self-driving system.

NTSB is further gathering information on all aspects of the crash. Meanwhile, Uber has announced to shut down all its self-driving programs in Arizona.