VIDEO: Waymo self-driving vehicle involved in accident in Chandler
May 4, 2018, 3:17 PM | Updated: May 5, 2018, 6:02 pm
PHOENIX — The Chandler Police Department was investigating a minor injury collision involving a self-driving vehicle Friday afternoon.
A Honda sedan driving eastbound on Chandler Boulevard near Chandler Fashion Center swerved to avoid another vehicle and struck a Waymo autonomous vehicle traveling in the opposite direction, according to police.
Waymo released a video of the incident on YouTube. The video shows the car that struck the Waymo vehicle drove through an intersection at the same time a car in the adjacent side was entering the intersection.
It swerved sharply before crashing into the driver’s side of the Waymo car.
The Waymo vehicle was traveling at a slow speed and in manual mode.
The operator in the driver’s seat sustained minor injuries.
Both the vehicles were towed from the scene.
Police said the self-driving vehicle was not at fault.
“The Waymo vehicle is not the violator vehicle. It just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Chandler police detective Seth Tyler told Phoenix New Times.
Two months ago, an Uber autonomous vehicle struck and killed a pedestrian in Tempe. Uber suspended its self-driving vehicle testing after that incident.
The head of Waymo, formerly Google’s driverless car project, said at the time his company’s technology could have avoided that accident.
