Self-driving fatality won’t stop technology
A self-driving Uber vehicle struck and killed a 49-year-old woman in Arizona last week but this unfortunate accident will not stop technology.
Critics have labeled the incident unfortunate, avoidable and some have called for termination of Uber’s nobrain-necessary, self-driving experiment, saying we have been blinded by science. Elaine Herzberg, 49, died after being struck by a XC 90 Volvo SUV late Sunday night in Tempe, Arizona. Investigators released a dashboard video of the incident that captured Herzberg being run down. The Volvo showed no sign of slowing while a human test driver reacted slowly. Rafael Vasquez, 44, a ride-along companion or the autonomous vehicle, appeared distracted. Vasquez reportedly, looked down just as Helzberg stepped into traffic. The video recorded as a snuff film that offered a split-second glimpse of death. A gift from the God of Technology who allows glimpses looks of these minute splices of life and tragedy. An online showing of the video warns that viewers may find the content disturbing. The caution sounds respectful and professional although web masters consider these videos gold mines, an accidental death captured in real time and worthy of thousands of website visitors. We watch as voyeurs, intrigued by death and thanking our lucky charms that some other poor victim served as collateral casualty as mankind chases any vainglorious invention that showcases superiority. Helzberg, believed to be the first autonomous car casualty, represents a bump in the highway, a weigh station on the road to Utopia. Technology exists as an unstoppable adversary that one can only hope to contain. One could connect harshly Helzberg to the hundred thousands lab rats who lay down their lives for science and the betterment of mankind.
Uber officials offered a soothing human response to Helzberg’s death. Empathy remains a requirement as technology takes a life or two, with product movers knowing that some lawsuits may develop but in the long run, self-driving cars being more than something just the cool kids own.
“Our hearts go out to the victim’s family,” an Uber spokesperson told numerous news outlets.
“We are fully cooperating with local authorities in their investigation of this incident.”
Uber has pulled its self-driving vehicles off public roads in the Phoenix metro area (including Tempe),
San Francisco, Toronto, and Pittsburgh. The National Transportation Safety Board opened an investigation of the accident.
Helzberg family members allegedly want criminal charges filed against Uber. Politicians offered insights about the accident and technology.
“This tragic incident makes clear that autonomous vehicle technology has a long way to go before it is truly safe for the passengers, pedestrians, and drivers who share America’s roads,”
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut) said in a statement.
“In our haste to enable innovation, we cannot forget basic safety.”
Blumethal delivers salient insight although technology has not delivered a solution to distracted driving accidents produced by cell phone use or sending text messages while driving.
Plus, autonomous vehicle development represents a multi-billion dollar industry. What’s a few deaths if we get to that global manifest destiny where machines matter more than people.
The passing of Elaine Helzberg holds our attention momentarily before we jump back into life’s fast lane or sit in traffic in the back of our autonomous vehicle.
Out on the open freeway, my AV power-shifts as we journey toward some Alvin Toffler-created futuristic world where mankind struggles with morality and machine.
Helzberg will be referenced eventually as footnote, a woman who stepped out of darkness and into consciousness; a sacrifice offered for technological development as we pursue the ultimate freedom of nothingness.