In this Monday, Sept. 12, 2016, photo, a group of self-driving Uber vehicles position themselves to take journalists on rides during a media preview at Uber's Advanced Technologies Center in Pittsburgh. On Monday, March 27, 2017, Uber said it is resuming its self-driving car program in Arizona and Pittsburgh after it was suspended following a crash over the weekend. The company had also grounded self-driving cars in San Francisco over the weekend but they resumed operating earlier on Monday. The company said that it paused the operations over the weekend to better understand what happened in Arizona, but feels confident in returning the cars to the road. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File) A crash that caused an Uber self-driving SUV to flip onto its side in a Phoenix suburb serves as a stark reminder of the lack of state oversight of autonomous vehicles in Arizona.
The accident was blamed on the driver of another SUV, but the public might never have known of the crash if it hadn't been widely publicized through social media posts.
That's because Republican Gov. Doug Ducey has left the fledgling self-driving car industry pretty much alone as part of his anti-regulation crusade.
Unlike California, companies operating self-driving autos in Arizona don't need to carry extra insurance or report accidents to the state. Ducey's spokesman says a driver monitoring the self-driving car is all the regulation that's needed.
Police say no one could have avoided Friday's crash.
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