The family of an American man who died after driving his car off a collapsed bridge while following instructions on the Google Maps app is suing Google for negligence. They claim that the tech giant was informed of the collapse of the structure, but failed to update the navigation system, continues to Associated press.
Philip Paxson, a medical device salesman and father of two, drowned last September 30 after his Jeep Gladiator plunged into a river in Hickory, North Carolina, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Wake County Superior Court.
The man was returning from his daughter’s birthday party after traveling through an unfamiliar neighborhood before Google Maps allegedly directed him to cross a bridge that had collapsed and not been rebuilt nine years earlier.
“Our girls ask how and why their father died, and I have no words for them to understand, because as an adult I still cannot understand how those responsible for the GPS directions and the bridge could have acted the way they did.” little respect for human life,” said his widow, Alicia Paxson.
Police officers who found Paxton’s body in his partially submerged car said there were no barriers or warning signs along the destroyed road and that he had fallen about twenty feet.
The North Carolina State Patrol emphasized that the bridge was not operated by local or state authorities and that the company responsible had been disbanded.
Several people alerted Google Maps to the bridge collapse in the years leading up to Paxson’s death and urged the company to update the navigation system, the lawsuit said.
The lawsuit includes email information from another Hickory resident who used the map’s “suggest edit” feature to alert Google to report motorists to the bridge collapse in September 2020, and from a confirmation email Google sent in November 2020 has sent, showing that the company accepted the suggestion and analyzed the proposed change.
“We extend our deepest condolences to the Paxson family. Our goal is to provide accurate route information on Google Maps and we are reviewing that process,” Google spokesperson José Castañeda told the Associated Press.
Source: DN
