Robert Williams, aged 25, tragically became the first person globally to die at the hands of a robotic machine. Employed at the Ford Motor Company casting plant in Flat Rock, Michigan, Williams met his demise on January 25, 1979, while operating a parts-retrieval system.
The malfunctioning machine, designed for transporting materials within the factory, was operating below its normal speed that day. In an attempt to address the issue, Williams climbed onto a shelving unit, only to be fatally struck from behind and crushed by a mechanical arm, as per legal records.
The robot failed to distinguish Williams as a human, mistaking him for an object to be moved immediately. Shockingly, the machine continued functioning for 30 minutes while Williams lay lifeless until his coworkers made the grim discovery.
In 1983, Williams’ family successfully sued Litton Industries, the machine’s manufacturer, citing inadequate safety measures for the powerful robotic arm. They were awarded a $10 million compensation, marking the largest personal injury settlement in the state at the time.
During the case, their attorney emphasized the importance of valuing human life and avoiding a return to past notions where people were considered disposable. The lawyer detailed how the robot’s hydraulic arm crushed Williams, leading to his instantaneous death before the machine resumed normal operations.
Following this incident, a second fatality involving a robot occurred in Japan, where a 37-year-old worker named Kenji Urada lost his life at the Kawasaki Heavy Industries plant in Akashi. Urada was killed by a malfunctioning mechanical arm while inspecting a robot, reportedly after inadvertently activating it by crossing a safety barrier in the factory.
The book “When Robots Kill: Artificial Intelligence Under Criminal Law” by Gabriel Hallevy described how the robot wrongly perceived Urada as a threat and pushed him into another machine to eliminate the supposed danger.
The robot’s powerful hydraulic arm crushed Urada, causing immediate death before the machine resumed its tasks.