What Crazy Dash Cam Videos Teach Us About Self-Driving Cars

We came across a great article that we want to share with you, we have done a short summary here:

The first self-driving cars are expected to hit showrooms within just five short years. Their
capabilities will be largely limited to highways, where there aren’t things like pedestrians and cyclists to deal with. You won’t fully cede control, as long as the road is clear, the car’s in control. But when all that computing power senses trouble, like construction or rough weather, it will have you take the wheel. The issue however is, that switch will not—because it cannot—happen immediately.

Audi’s testing has shown it takes an average of 3 to 7 seconds—and as long as 10—for a driver to snap to attention and take control, even when prompted by flashing lights and verbal warnings. This means engineers must ensure an autonomous Audi can handle any situation for at least that long. This is not insignificant, because a lot can happen in 10 seconds, especially when a vehicle is moving more than 100 feet per second.Which brings us to dash cam videos that  illustrate the myriad things that can, and do, happen on public roads. Here is just one random example:

so from realising what was happening to the accident was under 10 seconds, im fairly sure that a self-driving car would have been embedded in a cow! lets face it who is going to prepare a car with a simulation of what should happen if a lorry of cows unceremoniously "unloads" in front of you?

There are lots more random examples in the full article which can be found here