Two Ford Mustang Mach-Es running BlueCruise recorded zero braking and zero steering input in the seconds before killing 3 people across two separate crashes in 2024. As of 2026, there is still not a single federal safety standard written specifically for autonomous vehicles anywhere in the United States.
I’ve been tracking AV development for years, and the distance between how fast this technology is being deployed and how slowly regulators are responding has never felt more dangerous. A new national survey from Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety puts hard numbers on what many of us have quietly suspected — and the results are impossible to ignore.
The Ford BlueCruise Crashes That Demand Real Answers
The National Transportation Safety Board released investigation findings on 2 fatal crashes involving Ford’s BlueCruise partial automation system. One occurred in Philadelphia on March 3, 2024, killing 2 occupants. A second happened in San Antonio on February 24, 2024, killing 1. In both incidents, neither driver-applied nor system-initiated braking or steering was recorded before impact.
That is not a minor calibration issue — that is a system going completely silent at the exact moment it was supposed to intervene. Ford markets BlueCruise as a hands-free driving feature, and there are serious questions about whether drivers were ever given a realistic picture of its actual boundaries. The NTSB called the findings evidence of an urgent need for stronger oversight of automated driving systems, and I think that assessment is restrained rather than overstated.
81% of Americans Are Scared — And That Number Should Alarm Every Automaker
Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety commissioned Big Village to survey 2,023 US adults in March 2026, weighted to reflect national demographics by age, sex, region, race, and education. Some 81% said they are concerned about sharing the road with driverless passenger vehicles. That number rises to 85% when the question involves driverless tractor-trailers and delivery trucks rolling through the same intersections as families and cyclists.
Here’s the catch — those fears are not permanent. When asked whether minimum government safety requirements would ease their concerns, 61% of respondents said yes. That tells me the public is not anti-technology. They are anti-recklessness. They want a floor, a standard, a federal rule that says a driverless vehicle must prove it is safe before it occupies the same lane as their children. That is not an unreasonable ask.
No Vision Test, No Operating Limits, No Rules — Think About What That Means
Every human driver in America must pass a vision test before getting behind the wheel legally. A driverless car is currently not required to pass any equivalent before operating on public roads. The survey found 76% of respondents believe that should change immediately, and 74% want manufacturers required to disclose the exact conditions in which their AVs can safely operate — and to guarantee the vehicles never exceed those parameters in the real world.
The real story here is accountability. Shane Austin of Advocates told CarBuzz directly that some companies have marketed their technology as capable of operating with minimal human involvement when, in fact, no consumer vehicle sold in the US today legally permits a driver to disengage from the driving task. That gap between marketing language and legal reality is where people get hurt. Cathy Chase, president of Advocates, put it bluntly: Americans are calling for common sense protections that address the risks they face every single day.
The AEB Loophole Leaving Cyclists and Motorcyclists Exposed
Starting in 2029, all new cars sold in the US must include automatic emergency braking. That sounds like meaningful progress — until you read the fine print. The mandate covers pedestrians and says nothing about motorcyclists or bicycle riders. For a country where motorcycle fatalities remain disproportionately high and urban cycling infrastructure is expanding rapidly, that omission is hard to defend. Some 73% of survey respondents said AEB protection should be extended to cyclists and motorcyclists without delay.
The Magnus White and Safe Streets For Everyone Act (H.R. 7353) would close that gap, but it has not been signed into law. A separate AEB mandate for heavy trucks was folded into the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act years ago, and the rulemaking process still has not been completed. I think the pattern here is clear: regulatory timelines in this space move at a pace that bears no relationship to how fast the technology — and the crashes — are accumulating.
| Survey Finding | Public Response |
|---|---|
| Concerned about sharing roads with driverless cars | 81% agree |
| Worried about driverless trucks specifically | 85% agree |
| Concerns resolved by minimum federal safety standards | 61% yes |
| Support mandatory AEB for cyclists and motorcyclists | 73% support |
| Want mandatory “vision test” before AV road approval | 76% yes |
| Want operating condition disclosure from AV makers | 74% support |
| Support speed-assist tech for convicted repeat speeders | 72% support |
Why “Move Fast and Break Things” Cannot Apply to Public Roads
NHTSA data shows 39,254 people died in US car crashes in 2024. Another 2.4 million were injured. The agency estimates roughly 36,000 fatalities again in 2026. The case for autonomous vehicles rests on the argument that they won’t drink, won’t speed, won’t get distracted — and that argument has genuine merit. But as Austin stated plainly, those vehicles must perform as well or better than the best human drivers on the road. That bar is higher than many current systems can clear.
Today’s ADAS features, already deployed across millions of vehicles, have failed on documented occasions to correctly read and respond to road environments. Overreliance on these systems is a real and measured problem — not a theoretical one cooked up by Luddites. The industry cannot keep pointing to a driverless future as proof that current systems are safe enough. The crashes are happening now, and the federal framework to address them does not yet exist.
If you drive, ride, walk, or simply care about what’s sharing the road with you, I’d encourage you to look up H.R. 7353 and contact your representative directly. The survey data published by Advocates gives lawmakers a clear public mandate — 81% concern, 76% demanding safety testing, 73% pushing for broader AEB coverage. That is not a niche opinion. That is a national consensus waiting for someone in Washington to act on it.
