{"id":336790,"date":"2017-03-26T05:23:46","date_gmt":"2017-03-25T21:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/techcrunch.com\/?p=1468993"},"modified":"2017-03-26T05:23:46","modified_gmt":"2017-03-25T21:23:46","slug":"uber-grounds-entire-self-driving-fleet-as-it-probes-arizona-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/uber-grounds-entire-self-driving-fleet-as-it-probes-arizona-crash\/","title":{"rendered":"Uber grounds entire self-driving fleet as it probes Arizona crash"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Uber has now grounded\u00a0its entire autonomous test fleet\u00a0in the U.S., following an accident\u00a0in Arizona which left one of its Volvo SUVs flipped on its side earlier today. The car was in self-driving mode at the time of the incident.<\/p>\n

As we reported<\/a>\u00a0earlier, the company suspended the pilot\u00a0in Arizona in the immediate aftermath of the crash. But it has now said it\u2019s grounded its entire autonomous fleet \u2014 so also in the two other\u00a0regions where it is currently piloting the\u00a0self-driving cars: Pittsburg and San Francisco.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur vehicles in Arizona remain grounded while we continue our investigation. Our vehicles are grounded in Pittsburgh and SF today as well,\u201d an Uber spokeswoman told us.<\/p>\n

Four hours ago the same spokeswoman told us the fleet was grounded in Arizona but did not mention the other two locations so it appears the company has decided to expand the suspension in the past few hours.<\/p>\n

The spokeswoman confirmed that the Arizona grounding will last as long as the duration of the investigation into the crash\u00a0but added that the wider suspension does not have a set timing \u2014 so it\u2019s not clear how long all self-driving Ubers will be parked. Presumably at least for the rest of today.<\/p>\n

Although Uber pulled the autonomous vehicles out\u00a0of\u00a0SF last\u00a0December<\/a>, after a dispute\u00a0with local regulators, a smaller fleet returned to California\u2019s roads earlier this month<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 after it was\u00a0granted a permit to test two self-driving cars. In\u00a0Phoenix and Pittsburg Uber has been testing\u00a012 cars apiece.<\/p>\n

All Uber\u2019s\u00a0test vehicles\u00a0include\u00a0a human driver sitting in the driver\u2019s seat so they are in a position to take over driving should that be necessary.<\/p>\n

In the Arizona incident, in which no one has been reported seriously injured, the WSJ<\/a>\u00a0reports local police saying Uber\u2019s self-driving technology was not responsible\u00a0for the accident \u2014 instead\u00a0a regular vehicle \u201cfailed to yield\u201d.<\/p>\n

As we noted earlier, the crash\u00a0is just the latest in a string of bad news stories for Uber\u00a0\u2014 including several\u00a0related<\/a> to\u00a0its self-driving technology<\/a> but also\u00a0beyond that, with accusations the company has a problem with\u00a0systemic sexism<\/a>\u00a0in\u00a0its corporate\u00a0culture.<\/p>\n

That run of bad publicity might explain why it\u2019s taken the decision to err on the side of caution in this instance and ground all its autonomous vehicles, despite the tech not\u00a0being accused of culpability.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"\" Uber has now grounded its entire autonomous test fleet in the U.S., following an accident in Arizona which left one of its Volvo SUVs flipped on its side earlier today. Read More<\/a><\/p>\n

\n<\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a> <\/img><\/a>\n<\/div>\n

\"\"\/ <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5817,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[59,66,26],"class_list":["post-336790","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology","tag-media","tag-techcrunch","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5817"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336790\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}