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Crashes ‘inevitable’

Posted on 23 November, 2015

Experts believe self-driving vehicle technology “will only reach its full potential if it can withstand failures”. Iain Forbes, from the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Driving in the UK, says that while it may slash the number of road deaths, it will only happen if the public kept faith when “inevitable accidents” occur. “There are currently 1,700 deaths a year on British roads, despite them being some of the safest in the world,” he says. “While autonomous cars could reduce that figure by up to 90 per cent, people would still have to be comfortable with 170 deaths a year.” Speaking at a conference on the future impact of autonomous cars, Forbes acknowledges that future predictions are unreliable, and that legislation on self-driving cars will have to be introduced as it’s needed.