Philip Paxson’s family are suing the company over his death, alleging that Google negligently failed to show the bridge had fallen nine years earlier.
Mr Paxson died in September 2022 after attempting to drive over the damaged bridge in Hickory, North Carolina.
A spokesperson for Google said the company was reviewing the allegations.
The case was filed in civil court in Wake County on Tuesday.
Mr Paxson, a father of two, was driving home from his daughter’s ninth birthday party at a friend’s house and was in an unfamiliar neighbourhood at the time of his death, according to the family’s lawsuit.
His wife had driven his two daughters home earlier, and he stayed behind to help clean up.
“Unfamiliar with local roads, he relied on Google Maps, expecting it would safely direct him home to his wife and daughters,” lawyers for the family said in a statement announcing the lawsuit.
“Tragically, as he drove cautiously in the darkness and rain, he unsuspectingly followed Google’s outdated directions to what his family later learned for nearly a decade was called the ‘Bridge to Nowhere,’ crashing into Snow Creek, where he drowned.”
Local residents had repeatedly contacted Google to have them change their online maps after the bridge collapsed in 2013, the suit claims.
From the picture I could easily imagine myself falling into the hole if it was dark and rainy.
Presumably the road to the bridge would’ve been blocked off with signs and stuf? Is there any information about whether the signage was inadequate? Doesn’t excuse Google for but updating the map in almost a decade, but it seems either council or the driver have more responsibility here.
So how the hell do they blame google instead of the local government for failing to keep up the signs and blockades?
It’s such an idiotic case, “the guy drove blindly off a bridge because his navigation told him to”. So in the old days, he would’ve had a paper map and would have driven off the bridge the same way.
Multiple entities can hold responsibility, including:
This was a long running problem that Google was contacted to fix and didn’t. They don’t bear sole responsibility, but that is negligence that contributed to his death.
This is not on Google and in any way, shape or form. Google Maps is not a civil engineering project. Google is not a state or local governing entity.
What’s next? Google gets sued because someone missed out on an important interview? “Google Maps mislead me and caused me to lose out on a prospective job offer.”
I don’t think we know that yet, and I think the discovery will be interesting.
How many reports were there? Were they credible? What other sources of truth did Google consult in deciding to ignore those reports?
Google gets lots of reports and needs to filter out spam, and especially malicious reports like trying to mark a competitor’s business as closed, or trying to get less traffic in your neighborhood for selfish reasons. It wouldn’t be reasonable for Google to accept every user suggestion either.
So if Google reached out to the town and the town said the bridge is fine, then it’s not Google’s fault. If they ignored multiple credible complaints because the area was too rural to care about, that might be negligent.
the fault is shared. google was mentioned moreso because its big company and that makes a headline
I don’t know whether you didn’t read the article or are just one of these simpletons incapable of holding an opinion more nuanced that “good or evil”, but they are suing the owners.
Paper maps don’t talk to you and tell you which way to go, do they?
I seriously can’t decide whether you’re some Google shill or you’ve just given your brain the day off.
Nice b8 m8 not going to respond to a weak troll :)
Yeah, that’s definitely more the council’s responsibility then (or those vandals, if they find them).
How in hell were vandals able to remove anything?! There should have been dragon’s teeth or something similar blocking the road.
It sounds like their “barrier” was probably traffic cones or sawhorses—easily knocked over, stolen, or destroyed. What should have been there, but apparently wasn’t, was a double or triple row of concrete jersey barriers. Or something else that was too heavy or awkward to be easily stolen, or destroyed without leaving serious residue. Nothing like hitting concrete chunks all over the road to make someone slow waaaaaay down and take a look around.
Yeah, I’d say that whoever was responsible for keeping that road blocked off was the major culprit in this. Google is just a “they have deep pockets, and we might be lucky and get a judge who doesn’t know squat about how nav systems work” add-on.
Knowing about how nav systems work would make them more likely to find against Google, because an online nav system is trivially updatable. Even if they wanted to be extra cautious a simple call to the local police or a peek at a satellite image in the preceding 9 years would give confirmation.
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