Cruise AV drags pedestrian across street

A Cruise self-driving car ran over a pedestrian who had been hit by another vehicle, pinning the individual under one of its tires and dragging her 20 feet at 7 mph, worsening her injuries.

On October 2, 2023, a hit-and-run in San Francisco ended with a pedestrian 'stuck' under a Cruise autonomous vehicle (AV) having been hit by another, human-driven Nissan car, and dragged 20 feet across the road. Cruise disabled the vehicle, enabling rescuers to get the vehicle off the woman’s leg.

Cruise initially pinned the blame on the driver of the other car, but later said its automated driving system 'inaccurately characterized the collision as a lateral collision and commanded the AV to attempt to pull over out of traffic, pulling the individual forward, rather than remaining stationary.'

The incident, which had significant repercussions for the company, raised questions about the safety and integrity of Cruise's self-driving system and AV programme, the quality of its leadership, the ethics, values and culture of the company, its transparency and sense of accountability, and legal liability.

California license suspension

• October 23, 2023: California's Department of Motor Vehicles indefinitely suspended Cruise's self-driving service after determining that its driverless cars were regarded as unsafe, and that the company had 'misrepresented' information related to the safety of its vehicles. 

Vehicle recall

• November 8, 2023: Cruise recalled all 950 of its cars in the form of an update to its Collision Detection Subsystem so that the vehicle remains stationary during certain crash incidents, rather than pulling over to the side of the road. 

Employee terminations

• November 13, 2023: Cruise fired nine senior employees, retained the law firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP 'to examine and better understand Cruise’s response to the October 2 incident.'

GM spending reduced

• Cruise owner General Motors said it would'substantially' reduce spending on Cruise.