Autonomous car tech firm Waymo released a new study revealing that its self-driving vehicles are up to tenfold safer than benchmark human drivers.
Analysis
Waymo analyzed data of 7.14 million rider-only miles and compared it to a baseline of the number of times human drivers commonly get into crashes in the same area.
As of now, the company only operates in some parts of San Francisco, Phoenix, and Los Angeles. As expected, crash rates were different by location. San Francisco reported the highest rate of human-caused crashes at 5.55/million miles.
Waymo’s data showed a 57% reduction in crashes reported to the police and an 85% reduction in crashes that led to any bodily injury with its self-driving cars,
Waymo also exerted extra effort to conduct a study to determine the benchmark crash rates in each area.
“The goal was to say, here’s what the human crash population would have looked like if it had driven under similar conditions as what the automated vehicle did.”
John Scanlon, a safety researcher at Waymo and co-author of the study
Unreported crashes by human drivers
Waymo emphasized the underreporting of crashes by human drivers. As per the study, human drivers usually do not report minor crashes that do not cause injury to the police.
On the other hand, Waymo asserted that “autonomous vehicle companies report even the most minor crashes in order to demonstrate the trustworthiness of autonomous driving on public roads.”
It also indicated the significance of road type as the company only deploys its self-driving cars on surface streets and not highways. Notably, highways usually have fewer accidents than surface streets because they are simpler to navigate.
The comparison by location breakdown revealed that Waymo’s self-driving cars are up to tenfold less likely to cause crashes than human drivers (in San Fransisco). However, it has major reductions in all cases.
Electrek noted that Waymo’s report excluded Los Angeles in this breakdown due to the limited number of miles it contributed to the data.
Cruise’s mishaps
Waymo’s new report occurred amid a crucial time for the autonomous driving industry, following Waymo’s closest rival Cruise’s huge mishap in October.
The widely known “October incident” involved a woman pedestrian who was initially hit by a human driver. She landed in the path of an upcoming Cruise robotaxi, which dragged her approximately 20 feet away from the scene.
Since then, Cruise has continued to report discouraging news about the company’s future. It lost its Chief Executive and co-founder, Kyle Vogt. Cruise also laid off 24% of its workforce and lost its permit to operate robotaxis in the US.
All that said, it is indeed a perfect time for Waymo to showcase the safety and merit of its self-driving technology. Cruise’s downfall enabled Waymo to become the undisputed leader in the driverless taxi industry.
