Google Self-Driving Car Involved in Another Crash The Google car was driving autonomously at the time of the crash, but was not at fault.
This story originally appeared on PCMag
A Google self-driving Lexus was involved in a crash in Mountain View, Calif. on Friday afternoon. Fortunately, no one was injured.
According to a report from local TV station KRON, the Google car was, indeed, driving autonomously at the time of the crash, but was not at fault. The incident happened at around 1:30 p.m. near El Camino Real and Phyllis Avenue, when another vehicle ran a red light and hit the passenger side of Google's car.
Google did not immediately respond to PCMag's request for comment but confirmed the incident to TechCrunch. "A Google vehicle was traveling northbound on Phyllis Ave. in Mountain View when a car heading westbound on El Camino Real ran a red light and collided with the right side of our vehicle," the statement reads. "Our light was green for at least six seconds before our car entered the intersection."
The tech giant also used this opportunity to remind everyone why it's developing self-driving cars.
"Thousands of crashes happen everyday on U.S. roads, and red-light running is the leading cause of urban crashes in the U.S. Human error plays a role in 94 percent of these crashes, which is why we're developing fully self-driving technology to make our roads safer," Google said.
According to KRON, a human was behind the wheel of Google's car at the time of the incident. The Google vehicle (and presumably the human behind the wheel) sensed the other car crossing the intersection, at which point the human took over and applied the brakes, but the crash was unavoidable.
Images captured by bystanders show that the Google car with a huge dent on the passenger side, as you can see above.
The incident comes after a Google self-driving Lexus in February struck the side of a passing bus. That time, the Google car was at least partially responsible for the collision.
