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First Death Possibly due to Self Driving Car Recorded - Driverś Name revealed here

The first death potentially attributed to a self driving car has now been recorded. The victim, according to a Coronerś report is 40-year-old Joshua Brown, from Canton Ohio. Brown owned a technology company called Nexu Innovations. He died while driving a Tesla Model S, using the ¨autopilot΅mode, in May in Florida.

Tesla did not immediately release the drivers name deciding instead to release a statement: that described the victim only as: “a friend to Tesla and the broader EV community, a person who spent his life focused on innovation and the promise of technology and who believed strongly in Tesla’s mission.”

Brown shot many videos for his youtube channel using the autopilot feature racking up nearly two million views.

The attached video link shows one of Brownś videos illustrating how the self driving technology aided him in avoiding a different collision.

Joshua Brown in his Tesla from a video showing one of his self driving car test drives. Brown is the first to die in a crash that may have been related to autonomous driving technology.

Apple, Google, Ford and General motors are among other companies testing autonomous vehicles, but self driving cars have not been vigorously regulated to date. Brownś death is expected to focus attention on the technology that could lead to new rules and regulations. Tesla claims Brownś death is the first in over 130 million miles of testing for self driving vehicles.

Tesla says the accident was an anomaly, saying a tractor trailer drove across a highway, perpendicular to the Model S. “Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied,” the company said.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has opened a preliminary investigation.

Any possible impact from the fatality on Teslaś future stock value and public confidence in the company has not been immediately apparent.

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