Software Glitch Makes Lime Scooters Brake Randomly
A software glitch in Lime scooters has been randomly locking up the fron wheels causing accidents.
The sudden braking caused at least 30 injuries in 155 known incidents, with some of them to be serious, Lime told Auckland, New Zealand officials. On Friday, the city decided to suspend the San Francisco-based scooter company until it can prove its scooters are safe again.
"We recently became aware of a software issue that may cause the locking mechanism on the front wheel to engage while on a trip," Lime said in a statement. "Less than a fraction of a percent of all Lime trips in New Zealand have been impacted by this issue, specifically 0.0086%. While a small fraction of the more than 1.8 millions scooter rides to date, even one incident reported is too many."
The company said the excessive braking problem usually occurred when riders were going downhill at high speeds and hit a pothole or other obstacle in the road. The company is rolling out an update to its scooters globally.
Last month, Lime had removed its scooters from Switzerland after a similar string of random braking causing injuries to riders. At the time, Lime said it was investigating whether a software update was causing the scooters to reboot mid-ride, which would trigger its anti-theft braking system.