One of Google’s driveless, automated Toyota Prius vehicles has caused a four-car pile-up near the Google headquarters in Mountain View, California.

This image, recently given to Jalopnik in the US, shows the Google Toyota Prius with its various sensors and roof-mounted guidance equipment shortly after the incident. According to reports, up to four other vehicles were involved in the crash.

An official report is yet to be released, but as far as the story goes, the Google Prius ran into the back of another un-related Toyota Prius vehicle, which caused it to spear into a Honda Accord, which also punted another Accord. Business Insider has been in contact with Google, which said,

“Safety is our top priority. One of our goals is to prevent fender-benders like this one, which occurred while a person was manually driving the car.”

From this image it looks like a relatively minor bump and no one was seriously injured. It is interesting and quite ironic that a self-driving car, which has already completed hundreds of thousands of self-driving kilometres, has been caught up in a bingle only with a human behind the wheel.

Although it will be difficult to know for sure if a human was driving at the time, it does bring about an interesting question: Who is to blame for an autonomous car crash? Whose name is written on the police report? Feel free to give us your thoughts in the comments section below.