The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating a fatal crash in San Antonio involving a Ford electric vehicle that may have been using a partially automated driving system.
The agency said in a statement Friday that a team of investigators from its 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 shows a Ford Mustang Mach-E SUV equipped with the company's partially automated driving system collided with a Honda CR-V that was stopped in one lane of the highway.
The driver of the Mach-E told police the Honda stopped in the center lane without the lights on before the accident occurred around 9:50 p.m., KSAT-TV reported. The 56-year-old driver of the CR-V was killed.
“The NTSB is investigating this fatal crash because of its continuing interest in advanced driver assistance systems and how vehicle operators interact with these technologies,” the agency's statement said.
Ford's Blue Cruise system allows drivers to take their hands off the wheel while handling steering, braking and acceleration on highways. The company says that the system is not completely autonomous, and that it monitors drivers to ensure they are paying attention to the road. Ford says it operates on 97% of patrolled highways in the United States and Canada.
There are no fully self-driving cars for sale to the public in the United States
The NTSB said investigators will travel to San Antonio to examine the wreckage, gather information about the accident scene and look into the events leading up to the collision. A preliminary report is expected within 30 days.
Ford said in a statement that it is conducting research into the accident and that the facts are not yet clear. The company expressed its sympathy with those involved and said it had reported the incident to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
Both the NHTSA and NTSB have investigated previous crashes involving partially automated driving systems, most of which involved Tesla's Autopilot. In previous investigations, the NTSB has examined how the partially automated system worked.
