WATCH the incredible unearthed footage that shows the world’s first autonomous car in action, and it’s not one of Elon Musk’s Teslas.
Decades before self-driving cars were unleashed to the public a 1986 vehicle was moving without a human at the wheel.
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Musk is typically dubbed as the person who brought out self-driving vehicles.
Decades before Musk’s Tesla company was created a German man brought driverless vehicles onto European roads.
Ernst Dickmanns, a German scientist, developed a vehicle that was able to navigate roads on its own.
A group of German engineers came together in the 1980s to transform a Mercedes van, bought by Ernst.
The team took eight years to build their technological phenomenon and it hit the roads in 1986.
This van was filled with sensors that could detect cars, people, and objects around it.
The modified Mercedes was able to identify up to six items and obstructions at any one time.
The special car reached up to 59mph and was able to change lanes and stop on its own.
Despite his successes, Ernst’s plans were initially doubted at the German university where he ran his tests, according to Politico.
The scientist started out as an aerospace engineer but set his sights on revolutionising the car world.
Ernst said: “The colleagues at the university said, well, he’s an oddball, but he’s got a track record [of achievements in aerospace technology,] so let’s just let him do it.”
His modified van became the first self-driving car when it rode on a skidpan on the university campus.
He upped the stakes when he sent his creation down the unopened autobahn at top speeds.
Ernst then said he was approached by German carmaker Daimler to get a self-driving car on a busy Parisian road.
The creator revealed he found this proposition to be “absurd” but eventually agreed to take on the challenge.
The autonomous car picked up a group of elite visitors from Charles de Gaulle Airport and drove onto an open motorway where it was switched to self-drive mode.
Ernst’s creation was able to switch lanes on its own, while an engineer remained behind the wheel in case something went wrong.
One of the engineers said: “Sometimes, we would take our hands off the wheel.”
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This remarkable team even took one of their self-driving creations on a long ride from Southern Germany to Denmark.
Despite its successes, this car did not become mainstream due to a lack of funding from Daimler.
BIG CHANGES
Driverless cars are slowly becoming more and more normal on our roads.
Self-driving taxis have become a controversial part of San Francisco, as the Waymo robo-cabs don’t even have a driver behind these wheels for emergencies.
In February, a large crowd set one of these autonomous taxis alight in a fiery blaze in the middle of the major city.
Chilling footage showed an aggressive mob surrounding the white vehicle as plumes of back smoke soared into the sky.
