New Delhi: The police in San Francisco were faced with a strange situation recently when they pulled over a car at night for driving without headlights and found no one inside.
It happened on April 1, but wasn’t an April Fools' Day joke.
San Francisco police officers on patrol duty spotted the car operated by General Motors’ Cruise unit but found no one behind the wheel, news agency Reuters reported. Footage of the video has gone viral online.
One of the videos posted on Instagram shows two unnamed officers stopping the car, and are puzzled to see no humans inside.
"Ain’t nobody in it. This is crazy," said one of them as he tried to open the vehicle door.
The car drove away soon, to stop again in the next block.
Cruise is a self-driving or autonomous vehicle subsidiary owned by General Motors.
The company blamed “human error” for the lack of headlights, according to the Reuters report.
Cruise Chief Executive Kyle Vogt had previously admitted that a big challenge for self-driving cars is how to interact with humans, the Reuters report said.
The company also said it works closely with the police on this and has a dedicated phone number for the police to call.
Quoting the San Francisco police department, the report said the officers managed to contact the vehicle's remote operator and a maintenance team then took control. Cruise said the car was relocated to the nearest safe location.
The company is operating a few vehicles to give free driverless rides to the public at night in San Francisco, as it seeks the last regulatory approval required to go commercial, the report said.
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