Hapless Street View driver in three separate smashes with two buses and a truck

By Trevor Mogg September 16, 2013

hapless street view driver in three separate smashes with two buses and a truck car crash — Image used with permission by copyright holder

Google’s Street View cars are known to capture some pretty unusual imagery from time to time, though you can be certain a particular set of pictures gathered by one of its drivers in Indonesia last week will not be making it to the Web giant’s Maps feature.

According to an AFP report, a Street View driver gathering panoramic imagery on the outskirts of Jakarta was involved in not one, not even two, but three car smashes, all within a short space of time.

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The driver’s bad day started when he reportedly crashed into a bus in the Bogor district of Indonesia’s capital.

Apparently keen to do the right thing – initially, at least – the Street View driver accompanied the bus driver to a nearby garage. However, suddenly fearing a high repair bill, he jumped back into his damaged Google car and fled.

However, the bus driver was having none of it and gave chase in his vehicle for several miles, which led to the second smash involving the Street View car and another bus.

Out of control

Events were clearly spiraling out of control for the hapless Google employee, though that didn’t stop him from once again attempting to flee. With his run of bad luck showing no sign of letting up, he ended up driving straight into a parked truck. At this point he wisely gave up trying to escape and waited for the police to come and detain him.

Images posted on Indonesian site Kaskus show the Street View car with a beat-up front and damaged windshield.

Commenting on the incident, Bogor police chief Hendra Gunawan told AFP, “He has been released and all the payments for the vehicles have been sorted out. The damage to the first one would probably have cost 200,000 rupiah ($17.50) to repair.”

With Google intent on mapping all the world’s roads with its Street View cars, occasional accidents are bound to happen, though admittedly the driver in last week’s incident could have avoided at least two of his three smashes.

Earlier this year, the Mountain View company was forced to provide proof that it hadn’t driven over a donkey in Botswana after Web users came across Street View imagery that appeared to suggest it had.

“Our Street View teams take the safety of people and donkeys very seriously,” a Google spokesperson said at the time.

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Contributing Editor

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