Death of Elaine Herzberg

Elaine Herzberg
Born
Elaine Marie Wood

(1968-08-02)August 2, 1968
Phoenix, Arizona, U.S.[1]
DiedMarch 18, 2018(2018-03-18) (aged 49)
Tempe, Arizona, U.S.
Cause of deathHit by a self-driving car
Burial placePhoenix, Arizona[1]
EducationApache Junction High School, Apache Junction, Arizona[1]
Spouse(s)Mike Herzberg (until his death); Rolf Erich Ziemann (until Elaine's death)[1]

The death of Elaine Herzberg (August 2, 1968 – March 18, 2018) was the first recorded case of a pedestrian fatality involving a self-driving car, after a collision that occurred late in the evening of March 18, 2018. Herzberg was pushing a bicycle across a four-lane road in Tempe, Arizona, United States, when she was struck by an Uber test vehicle, which was operating in self-drive mode with a human safety backup driver sitting in the driving seat. Herzberg was taken to the local hospital where she died of her injuries.[2][3][4]

Following the fatal incident, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) issued a series of recommendations and sharply criticized Uber. The company suspended testing of self-driving vehicles in Arizona,[5] where such testing had been approved since August 2016.[6] Uber chose not to renew its permit for testing self-driving vehicles in California when it expired at the end of March 2018.[7] Uber resumed testing in December 2018, starting in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.[8]

In March 2019, Arizona prosecutors ruled that Uber was not criminally responsible for the crash.[9] The back-up driver of the vehicle was charged with negligent homicide,[10] pled guilty to endangerment, and was sentenced to three years' probation.[11]

While Herzberg was the first pedestrian killed by a self-driving car, driver Gao Yaning died in a Tesla semi-autonomous car two years earlier. A reporter for The Washington Post compared Herzberg's fate with that of Bridget Driscoll who, in the United Kingdom in 1896, was the first pedestrian to be killed by an automobile.

The Arizona incident has magnified the importance of collision avoidance systems for self-driving vehicles.[12]

  1. ^ a b c d "In Memoriam: Elaine Marie Herzberg". www.sonoranskiesmortuaryaz.com. Archived from the original on August 23, 2019. Retrieved June 4, 2018.
  2. ^ Will Pavia (March 21, 2018). "Driverless Uber car 'not to blame' for woman's death". The Times. Archived from the original on August 23, 2019. Retrieved March 22, 2018.
  3. ^ Wakabayashi, Daisuke (March 19, 2018). "Self-Driving Uber Car Kills Pedestrian in Arizona, Where Robots Roam". The New York Times. Archived from the original on April 21, 2020. Retrieved March 22, 2018.
  4. ^ "Video shows moment of fatal Uber crash". BBC News. March 22, 2018. Archived from the original on November 30, 2018. Retrieved July 21, 2018.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference SFG-180321 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Guardian-180328 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Carolyn Said (March 27, 2018). "Uber puts the brakes on testing robot cars in California after Arizona fatality". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on August 21, 2019. Retrieved March 28, 2018.
  8. ^ Hawkins, Andrew J. (December 20, 2018). "Uber's self-driving cars return to public roads for the first time since fatal crash". The Verge. Retrieved December 15, 2022.
  9. ^ "USA: Uber critiqué pour un accident fatal en 2018". Reuters. November 20, 2019. Retrieved April 1, 2022.
  10. ^ "Uber's self-driving operator charged over fatal crash". BBC News. September 16, 2020. Retrieved April 1, 2022.
  11. ^ Billeaud, Jacques; Snow, Anita (July 28, 2023). "The backup driver in the 1st death by a fully autonomous car pleads guilty to endangerment". Associated Press. Retrieved September 1, 2024.
  12. ^ Umar Zakir Abdul, Hamid; et al. (2018). "A review on threat assessment, path planning and path tracking strategies for collision avoidance systems of autonomous vehicles". International Journal of Vehicle Autonomous Systems. 14 (2). Archived from the original on March 31, 2021. Retrieved July 21, 2019.