A Cuban known on TikTok as El Yase Jewelry had an unusual encounter when he came across a car driving without anyone at the wheel, which ended up blocking his way in the middle of the street. The scene, which he recorded while trying to understand what was happening, has gone viral on social media.
In the video shared on TikTok on October 15, the Cuban shows a white vehicle that remains stopped on the road with no visible driver. Although he attempts to let it pass, the car does not move as expected and ends up positioned in the middle of the lane he was traveling in.
"Hey, if there's no one in that car over there, how is it possible that we have to give it a chance?" the man remarks, between laughter and confusion, as he observes the strange situation.
During the recording, which lasts about a minute and a half, the Cuban honks the horn several times and waits for the vehicle to move, but his attempts are in vain.
"You can't give him a break; look at this, he's completely stuck right in the middle and he's just staying there, there's no one there, no driver, nothing," he exclaims, amazed by what he is witnessing.
In the face of uncertainty, he decides to keep recording as a precaution. "I'm recording just in case something happens," he assures, before choosing to go around the car so he can continue on his way.
"I had to go around because the boxer got stuck there in the middle," he explains as he walks away from the vehicle.
The Cuban himself suspects that someone might be controlling the car remotely. "That's someone who is controlling it; it's just impossible," he states during the recording.
However, the car shown in the images is a Jaguar I-PACE equipped with autonomous driving technology from Waymo, the company owned by Alphabet, the parent company of Google.
These vehicles are part of the autonomous taxi service from Waymo, which operates in various cities across the United States and allows for the transportation of passengers without the need for a human driver behind the wheel.
According to the company on its official Waymo Driver page, its vehicles use a combination of cameras, radars, laser sensors, and artificial intelligence systems to detect other vehicles, pedestrians, and obstacles, interpret traffic conditions, and navigate autonomously.
Therefore, although the Cuban thought that someone was controlling the car remotely, it is a vehicle designed to drive itself. However, the images do not allow us to determine why it stopped in the middle of the road or what caused its behavior at that moment.
The post had accumulated over 1.2 million views, nearly 20,000 "likes," and more than 3,200 shares, as well as hundreds of comments from users amazed by the images.
"Did you see that? Now you tell me," concludes the Cuban, who couldn't believe what he had just witnessed.
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