GPS Tracking Disaster: Japanese Tourists Drive Straight into the Pacific

Jack

Administrator
Thread author
Verified
Staff Member
Well-known
Jan 24, 2011
9,377
ABC News said:
Three Japanese tourists in Australia, misled by their GPS device. Fairfax Media/Getty Images
Three Japanese tourists in Australia found themselves in an embarrassing situation after their GPS navigation system lured them down the wrong path.
The three, who are students from Tokyo, set out to drive to North Stradbroke Island on the Australian coast Thursday morning, and mapped out their path on their GPS system.
The road looked clear, at low tide - but the map forgot to show the 9 miles of water and mud between the island and the mainland.
As the three drove their rented Hyundai Getz into Moreton Bay, they found the GPS device guiding them from a gravel road into thick mud. They tried to get back to solid ground, but as the tide rose they were forced to abandon their car. Passengers on passing ferries watched in amazement.
"It told us we could drive down there," Yuzu Noda, 21, told the local Bayside Bulletin. "It kept saying it would navigate us to a road. We got stuck . . . there's lots of mud."
Noda and her friends made it about 50 yards offshore before they realized they were stranded. A tow truck driver eventually gave them a lift back to the mainland. The students decided not to have the car repaired because of the damage. The car was insured, though Noda will still have to pay about $1,500 that was not covered.

Read more : http://gma.yahoo.com/gps-tracking-disaster-japanese-tourists-drive-straight-pacific-172043575--abc-news.html
 

HeffeD

Level 1
Feb 28, 2011
1,690
I'm sorry, but I find it very hard to feel any sort of sympathy for these types of stories. If a person abandons common sense to blindly follow their GPS receivers directions, they deserve whatever situation they find themselves in. I mean, the destination was an island! The very name would tend to indicate that this piece of land is surrounded by water. Any roadway to access the island would need to be a bridge or causeway. Not just head across the seabed...

Even if you ask your navigation system to follow roads, it can only direct you to the nearest road, then it will offer off-road 'as the crow flies', directions if there are no more roads that will take you there.

These are the types of people that require companies to print 'Caution: Contents may be hot', warnings on coffee cups...
 

Viking

Level 26
Verified
Honorary Member
Top Poster
Well-known
Oct 2, 2011
1,531
Some people should just use their eyes!

The blind leading the blind!
 

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