The Snow Creek Bridge in North Carolina collapsed in 2013 and was never repaired. It was also never physically marked or cordoned off.
On top of that, despite being notified multiple times that the bridge was out, Google never updated their maps app either.
So on a pitch-black, rainy night on Sept. 30, 2022 after staying late to clean up after his 9-year-old daughter's birthday party, Phillip Paxson trusted the machine and crossed the bridge blind.
His Jeep Gladiator plunged into the river below, killing him.
A year later, his widow, who had driven home with their two daughters in a separate car, is suing Google for negligence and wrongful death.
You might wonder, like I did, why she didn't sue the county or the state for not maintaining the road; North Carolina isn't run by libertarians, after all.
Well, funny I should mention that, the bridge in question was on a private road that belonged to a company that went bankrupt and dissolved in the 1990's, so the road's maintenance went with it.
Because of that, the bereft widow is suing the only party available: the company that directed her husband to cross the non-existent bridge via an automated GPS app.
Google released the following statement regarding the lawsuit:
We have the deepest sympathies for the Paxson family. Our goal is to provide accurate routing information in Maps and we are reviewing this lawsuit.
Stories like this just make me all the more hesitant to hand over the steering wheel to an automated system.
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