Uber Test Vehicle Kills Pedestrian in Tempe

Physical agent · Autonomous test vehicle · Found first by developer

An Uber self-driving test vehicle with a distracted backup operator struck and killed Elaine Herzberg in Tempe, Arizona, in March 2018. Uber left emergency braking to a human it did not monitor well, and only an NTSB investigation exposed it, three years before NHTSA required crash reports from automated vehicles.

What happened

The Car Saw Her 5.6 Seconds Out and Never Braked

Detection: the system detected Herzberg 5.6 seconds before impact but never classified her as a pedestrian or predicted her path.
Braking: the design did not allow emergency braking to reduce a collision and relied on the operator to intervene.
Operator: the backup operator was looking at her phone and looked up about one second before impact.
Oversight: NTSB cited Uber's inadequate safety culture and Arizona's weak oversight of testing.

Timeline

The Federal Crash Rule Came Three Years Later

Timeline
Date	Event	Source
March 18, 2018	An Uber self-driving test SUV strikes and kills Elaine Herzberg as she crosses a road in Tempe, Arizona	NTSB
March 26, 2018	Governor Doug Ducey suspends Uber's self-driving tests in Arizona	Engadget
March 5, 2019	The Yavapai County Attorney finds no basis for criminal liability for Uber	CNBC
November 19, 2019	NTSB finds the operator's distraction the probable cause, with Uber's safety culture contributing	NTSB
July 28, 2023	The backup operator pleads guilty to endangerment and receives three years of supervised probation	NPR

Controls that failed

Uber Relied on a Human It Did Not Watch

Controls that failed
Control	Company	What failed	137AI page
Object classification	Uber ATG	The system detected the pedestrian 5.6 seconds out but never classified her or predicted her path	Behavioral Envelopes
Emergency braking	Uber ATG	Automatic emergency braking was disabled in autonomous mode and left to the operator	Behavioral Envelopes
Operator oversight	Uber ATG	The company had no countermeasure for a backup operator watching her phone	Human Oversight

Reporting

NTSB Investigated; No Reporting Rule Required It

Reporting rules and this incident
Rule	Status	Why
NHTSA Standing General Order 2021-01	Not in force	The Standing General Order on automated vehicle crash reporting started in June 2021, three years later
NTSB investigation	Applied	NTSB investigated on its own authority and published report HAR-19/03
Arizona testing rules	Applied	Arizona's governor suspended Uber's testing permission eight days after the crash

Every rule tracked is on Incident Reporting Rules and Registries.

Response

Arizona Suspended Testing and the Operator Was Charged

Regulators and courts: Arizona suspended Uber's testing on March 26, 2018. Yavapai County declined to charge Uber in March 2019. NTSB adopted its findings on November 19, 2019. The backup operator pleaded guilty to endangerment in July 2023 and received three years of supervised probation.
Remediation: Uber halted its self-driving tests and left Arizona.

Record

Incident Record

Incident ID: 2018-03-UBER-TEMPE
AI Incident Database: Incident 4
Sources: NTSB investigation HWY18MH010 and report HAR-19/03 (November 2019); CNBC (March 2019); NPR (July 2023)
Last verified: October 2026