RCMP stops suspected drunk driver on Vancouver Island, finds out it’s a self-driving car

An RCMP officer recently pulled over a car in the city of Campbell River on Vancouver Island for suspected drunk driving only to find out that the people in the car were sober.

The erratic driving behaviour was reportedly caused by the vehicle’s driver assistance programs struggling to stay between the road lines. Driving.ca’s report doesn’t mention if this was a company experimenting with new technology or if it was just someone testing how good the driver assistance in their car is.

My bet is that it was someone with a new car trying to learn how well the vehicle’s driver assistance programs work. I’ve been in this situation before when testing a vehicle, and while I’ve never been pulled over, when you get in a new car with a lane guidance system, it makes sense to figure out how well it works — and the only way to do that is to test it out.

If you find yourself in a similar situation, make sure you research what your car is capable of and ensure you’re not around other drivers. Another thing to note is that most automakers lock their self-driving features behind a paid add-on with a convoluted name like ‘Co-Pilot360 Active 2.0 Prep Package.’

This means that while Tesla’s vehicles receive a lot of hype for their self-driving features, not all the company’s cars include the same driver assistance capabilities.

Source: Driving.ca