Autonomous big rigs are now operating on California highways, and that shift is forcing drivers, insurers, and courts to rethink who pays when a crash happens. Under regulations the California DMV adopted on April 28, companies can test autonomous trucks over 10,001 pounds, provided each starts with a safety driver behind the wheel and logs 500,000 miles per phase before moving to driverless operations. Kodiak AI and Aurora have received testing permits, and on September 22, Kodiak began hauling freight between Fresno and Los Angeles. The Teamsters are challenging the rules in Alameda County Superior Court.
For East County drivers who share Interstate 8 and State Routes 67 and 125 with these vehicles, the practical question is what happens after a collision. Barry P. Goldberg, A Professional Law Corporation is advising local drivers on how fault works when a self-driving truck causes a crash. The firm’s truck accident lawyer in El Cajon, CA represents people injured by commercial vehicles along those corridors.
“A self-driving truck doesn’t change the basic question of who caused the crash. It changes how many companies may share the answer,” said Barry P. Goldberg, founder of the firm and a recognized authority on uninsured and underinsured motorist law in California. “The key evidence lives in the truck’s software and sensor logs, and the companies on the other side control those records.”
In conventional truck crashes, fault can rest with the driver, the trucking company, the business that loaded the cargo, or the shop that maintained the vehicle. Self-driving trucks add two new layers. First, the safety driver: during testing, a human operator must sit behind the wheel, and an operator who fails to take control can share fault with the carrier that employs them. Second, the technology company: when an automated driving system malfunctions, injured people may pursue a product liability claim against the company that designed it.
That expanded pool of potential defendants matters because evidence can disappear quickly. Injured people should note the company names on the truck and contact a lawyer early, so every company involved receives a letter requiring it to keep its records, including software and sensor logs. Whatever happens with the Teamsters’ lawsuit, California law still lets them pursue every party that contributed to the crash.
The stakes extend beyond individual cases. As autonomous freight expands, the companies deploying it will face pressure to define responsibility before a jury does. For now, the legal framework remains the same: victims can seek compensation from each party whose conduct helped cause their injuries, whether that party is a human driver, a motor carrier, or the maker of the software that was supposed to drive.
