Waymo Recreates Crashes On Simulator
Google sister company Waymo reconstructed 72 accidents and recreated them on a simulator to find out how a Waymo autonomous vehicle would have handled these driving situations. The study divides the seven dozen accidents that happened between 2008 and 2017 in Chandler, Arizona, into two clusters. One with the Waymo vehicle as the at-fault part – the so-called ‘initiator’, the other with the Waymo vehicle as the innocent part – the so-called ‘responder’.
The results showed that Waymo, as the initiator, was able to prevent 100 percent of the accidents. Not surprisingly, since these accidents were caused by excessive speed, drunk driving, fatigue or distractions. As a ‘responder’, 82 percent of the accidents could also still be avoided through evasive maneuvers or other reactions. In 10 percent of the cases, the severity of the accident was reduced.
More details are available on the Waymo blog and in the study.
This article was also posted in German.
