Baidu responds to the incident of its unmanned test vehicle hit-and-run as a minor scratch and has reached a settlement with the car owner

Baidu responds to hit-and-run incident with unmanned test vehicle as minor scratch, settles with car owner

【Phoneauto News】On July 17th, a blogger released a video online showing a Baidu-owned self-driving test vehicle changing lanes and colliding with a vehicle behind it, and then unexpectedly leaving the scene. Netizens jokingly referred to it as “self-driving car hit and run”. Shortly after, the blogger updated their Weibo post and included the latest response from Baidu.

The blogger stated that after the video was released, Baidu explained the situation at the time of the incident and stated that it was a “very minor contact between the vehicles’ tires”, which was promptly handled and resolved with the driver. Baidu emphasized that there was no issue of hit and run.

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Latest reply from the blogger

From the previously published video, it can be seen that a self-driving test vehicle suddenly changed lanes and collided with the vehicle on the far left lane. After a brief pause, the self-driving test vehicle then drove away on its own. Since the self-driving test vehicle affected the normal passage of the vehicles behind it during the lane change, it is likely to bear full responsibility for the accident. Based on the logo on this self-driving vehicle, it belongs to Baidu’s self-driving company “Luobo KuaiPao”.

Video screenshot

It is understood that Luobo KuaiPao is a new upgraded autonomous driving travel service platform brought by Baidu Apollo. It currently provides ride-hailing services in multiple cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Wuhan, Chengdu, and Changsha. As of July 2022, Luobo KuaiPao has accumulated over 2 million orders. Baidu plans to expand Luobo KuaiPao’s autonomous driving travel service to 30 cities and deploy at least 3,000 autonomous driving vehicles to serve 30 million users by the end of 2023.

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