LConventional taxi drivers are not at risk of losing their jobs right away. On the night of June 28 to 29, some autonomous cars from the American company Cruise, a subsidiary of General Motors, suddenly stopped in San Francisco, as reported by BFMTV. These six autonomous taxis broke down, in the middle of the road, and generated traffic jams for several hours. Without explaining the origin, Cruise however apologized for these malfunctions.
“We had an issue earlier this week which caused some of our vehicles to be grouped together. Although the problem has been resolved and no passengers have been affected, we apologize to each inconvenienced person, ”said a spokesperson for the American company, with our colleagues from TechCrunch. Testimonials published on social networks reveal that technicians had to go on site to repair the vehicles.
Some @Cruise robotaxis appeared to be stuck in SF last night at the corner of Gough St. and Fulton St.
Human ops apparently had to rescue them. Still some kinks to iron out. pic.twitter.com/eXDocjVfHU
— Taylor Ogan (@TaylorOgan) June 30, 2022
The incident came just a week after the self-driving taxis began commercial operation in San Francisco, with Cruise securing the right to charge customers in early June. And this, in a context where the attraction around autonomous vehicles, in particular for shared uses, is growing across the Atlantic.
However, this is not the company’s first controversy. Last April, one of his cars was stopped by police who wanted to impose a fine on him because his lights were off at night. However, the police did not know to whom to send the fine, as the vehicle did not accommodate a driver.
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