AV and EV Collide, Revealing Apple's Self-driving Car Program in Action

Accident reports sometimes reveal more than just who was at fault. A rear-end collision in Sunnyvale, California, last week was truly a product of our modern age — an electric car slamming into the back of what would have been a human-operated crossover, were it not owned by Apple.

While the iPhone maker abandoned its Project Titan self-driving car project in 2016, it didn’t leave the autonomous vehicle field altogether. The August 24th collision shows it.

According to an accident report uncovered by Reuters, the Apple test vehicle was not a so-called “iCar” — a term tossed around back when Apple had a fully self-developed vehicle in its sights — but a Lexus RX 450h outfitted with autonomous driving gear.

The report claims the Apple-operated vehicle was in autonomous mode, attempting to merge onto the southbound Lawrence Expressway at less than 1 mph, when the collision occurred. While slowed and waiting for a gap to open up (in what was hopefully very slow-moving traffic), a 2016 Nissan Leaf collided with the rear of the vehicle at a speed of about 15 miles per hour.

Apple confirmed the accident report but wouldn’t say which vehicle was at fault. Neither the human minder on board the Lexus or the driver of the Leaf sustained injuries.

In June of last year, Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed the company was indeed working on self-driving vehicle technology, calling it “the mother of all A.I. projects.” It secured a permit to test autonomous vehicles on California roads around the same time.

Still cloaked in secrecy, information on Apple’s efforts does exist. The company reportedly has 5,000 people working on the project, many of them focused on developing circuit boards and a proprietary chip. Sixty Apple test vehicle ply California’s roads, permits show. One of the tech giant’s areas of focus involves developing software to help self-driving vehicles spot pedestrians.

[Image: Lexus]