Uber ATG Autonomous Vehicle Killed Pedestrian in First Autonomous Fatality
Uber Advanced Technologies Group
What happened
An Uber self-driving test vehicle struck and killed Elaine Herzberg in Tempe, Arizona. The system detected the pedestrian but misclassified her, and the automatic emergency braking was disabled during autonomous operation.
Root cause
Object classification system failed under novel scenario; emergency braking disabled as a design choice; human safety driver monitoring inadequate.
Architectural failure
Safety-critical override disabled without compensating human oversight requirement; no mandatory human-in-the-loop for novel/uncertain perception scenarios.
Outcome
Uber suspended all autonomous vehicle testing for nine months. Safety driver charged with negligent homicide. Uber sold ATG division to Aurora in 2020. First autonomous vehicle pedestrian death in history.
Architectural Failure Patterns
These pattern categories on aipatterns.com.au describe the systemic failure modes this incident exhibited.
human in the loop
human override pattern
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human in the loop
ai confidence threshold routing
aipatterns.com.au
governance
ai risk assessment framework
aipatterns.com.au
governance
ai incident management
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observability
ai incident management
aipatterns.com.au
governance
ai audit trail
aipatterns.com.au
Cite this incident
https://corporateai.com.au/incidents/uber-atg-pedestrian-death-2018Quick facts
- Date
- 18 March 2018
- Organisation
- Uber Advanced Technologies Group
- Sector
- Other
- Severity
- Critical
- Regulatory bodies
- NHTSA Automated Vehicle PolicyArizona AV Testing RegulationsNTSB Investigation Standards
- Tags
- autonomous-vehiclespedestrian-fatalitysafety-criticalsensor-failurehuman-oversightedge-case
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Explore failure patterns
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