A self-driving shuttle crashed on its very first day on the road

Things don’t always run smoothly when it comes to technology, especially when that technology is the kind that’s doing things by itself without human intervention, it turns out.

Test of self-driving technology have been de-railed after one of the autonomous pods crashed on its very first day.

The Navya and Keolis vehicle collided with a lorry while carrying several passengers in Las Vegas where the shuttles are meant to be zipping up and down its famous strip.

Read more: Driverless cars are coming to the streets of Britain

No one was injured and officials, who described it as a “fender bender” according to the BBC, have said it was the fault of the (human) lorry driver, who ended up being given a ticket.

“A delivery truck was coming out of an alley,” said Jace Radke, a spokesperson for the city.

“The shuttle did what it was supposed to do and stopped. Unfortunately the human element, the driver of the truck, didn’t stop.”

It’s not the first time that things have gone wrong with such technology: Uber was forced to suspend its trials for a short time after a crash in Arizona left one of its cars on its side.

An Uber self-driving car ended up on its side (Source: Reuters)

It’s the first time the shuttles have been tested in the US but they have already arrived in London, where the former Olympic park in Stratford began a trial by Navya and Keolis in September.

Google’s Waymo this week announced its first fully self-driving cars without humans ready to take the wheel will arrive on public roads.