Cause of driverless bus crash at Hong Kong airport must be found: John Lee

Hong Kong’s leader has pledged to find out the cause of a crash involving a pair of unmanned buses at the city’s airport, as he reassured residents that authorities will closely supervise companies testing driverless technologies.

Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu on Tuesday also said that autonomous transport systems were becoming a trend globally and that authorities would work hard to ensure they were safe for use in Hong Kong.

On Sunday, a pair of driverless buses used to transport staff collided in a restricted area of the city’s airport.

Though neither bus had passengers on board and airport operations were unaffected, the Airport Authority suspended part of its driverless bus operation to carry out an inspection, while the Transport and Logistics Bureau called for an investigation into the incident.

“They must find the cause of the incident, so they can prevent this from happening again,” Lee said ahead of his weekly meeting with the government’s top decision-making Executive Council.

At the same time, Lee noted that driverless transport was a trend worldwide and that autonomous vehicles had been used in the airport’s restricted area for almost seven years, covering a total of 2.3 million kilometres (1.43 million miles).

Hong Kong has been accelerating the development of autonomous driving services in the city, with the Transport Department last week extending trial runs to Tung Chung allowing three private driverless vehicles to be operated during each road test.