DETROIT– The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating a fatal crash in San Antonio, Texas, involving a Ford electric vehicle that may have used a partially automated driving system.
The agency said in a statement Friday that a team of investigators from the Office of Highway Safety will travel to Texas and work with police on the Feb. 24 crash on Interstate 10.
The NTSB said preliminary information indicates that a Ford Mustang Mach-E SUV equipped with the company’s partially automated driving system collided with the rear of a Honda CR-V that was stopped in one of the highway lanes.
Television station KSAT reported that the Mach-E driver told police that the Honda had stopped in the center lane without lights before the crash around 9:50 p.m. The 56-year-old driver of the CR-V was killed.
“NTSB is investigating this fatal accident because of its continued interest in advanced driver assistance systems and the way vehicle drivers interact with these technologies,” the agency’s statement said.
Ford’s Blue Cruise system allows drivers to take their hands off the wheel while controlling steering, braking and acceleration on highways. The company says the system is not fully autonomous and that it monitors drivers to make sure they are paying attention to the road. It operates on 97% of highways in the U.S. and Canada, Ford says.
There are no fully autonomous vehicles for sale to the public in the US
The NTSB said investigators will travel to San Antonio to examine wreckage, gather information about the crash scene and investigate the events leading up to the collision. A preliminary report is expected within 30 days.
In a statement, Ford said it was investigating the crash and that the facts were not yet clear. The company expressed its condolences to those involved and reported the accident to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Both NHTSA and the NTSB have investigated several previous crashes involving partially automated driving systems, most involving Tesla’s Autopilot. In previous investigations, the NTSB investigated how the partially automated system functioned.
