After Tesla’s Autopilot, it is the turn of BlueCruise, Ford’s autonomous driving system, to be at the center of an official NHTSA investigation. The technology was activated during two accidents which caused several victims.
As you may know, Tesla is not the only manufacturer to offer assisted or autonomous driving systems in its electric cars. This is also the case for Ford with its technology BlueCruise. However, we have just learned that the American trademark system is currently the subject of a federal investigation led by the NHTSAthe American agency in charge of road safety.
The institution has reportedly decided to carry out in-depth investigations into the advanced driving assistance software following several fatal accidents during which it was activated. These two crashes took place in 2024 in San Antonio and Philadelphia and are currently the focus of a National Transportation Safety Board investigation.
NHTSA investigating Ford’s BlueCruise system
According to the first elements shared in the NHTSA report, it is indicated that the vehicles involved, namely Mustang Mach-Es, each time struck vehicles parked on the emergency lanes. This detail necessarily reminds us of the numerous incidents which have concerned Tesla’s Autopilot. In 2021, the NHTSA chose to open an investigation into the manufacturer’s system after several collisions with emergency vehicles parked on the highway.
For beginners, certain cars from the blue oval brand such as the Mustang Mach-E or the F-150 Lightning are equipped with Co-Pilot360 Active, a set of driving assistance technologies. BlueCruise is obviously one of them. The system uses a combination of radars and cameras to detect and track the position and speed of other vehicles on the road. And since it is only a level 2 autonomous driving system, the manufacturer must ensure to integrate processes to monitor driver attention. An infrared camera installed on the steering column is responsible for doing this by analyzing the user’s gaze and head position.
We imagine that the NHTSA will pay particular attention to this aspect. As a reminder, the agency had rightly criticized Tesla for not having established sufficiently effective systems to guarantee driver engagement when Autopilot was activated. The brand was forced to recall 2 million vehicles to strengthen its alert systems. Recently, the NHTSA decided to open a new investigation to evaluate the effectiveness of the fixes made by the manufacturer. At the same time, Tesla was not found responsible for the various accidents involving Autopilot.
Source: The Verge