Audi's A7 Jack driverless car has begun its two-day, 550-mile journey from San Francisco to Las Vegas in what could be the longest recorded ride for an autonomous vehicle.
The end destination is this year's Consumer Electronics Show, where the German automaker will offer tours of the A7 Jack and unveil the software and hardware that give the car its self-driving capabilities, according to Chinatopix.
The vehicle's sensors and cameras are designed for mapping out the road and recognizing signs, objects and cars ahead.
Additional features include a laser scanner behind the front grille that serves as back-up for detecting objects on the road, as well as two buttons that will switch the car into self-driving mode when the driver presses them at the same time, The Telegraph reported.
The A7 Jack is capable of breaking, changing lanes and accelerating on its own up to 70 miles per hour, but the driver must take over once the car reaches the edge of a town or city. The vehicle can tell if the driver takes over and will pull over safely and stop if the driver doesn't resume control.
"My expectation is that I'll get extremely bored after a couple of minutes, because that's what we want to show," said Daniel Lipinski, Audi's head of development on the project. "We want to show how the vehicle drives in scenarios where the customer, his load is going down and you don't want to drive because it's too boring."
Audi says it will be a few years before its driverless car will be available to consumers due to current road limitations, Chinatopix reported.
Other automakers currently involved in the autonomous race include Tesla Motors, with CEO Elon Musk claiming that his self-driving cars will still allow drivers to take control when they want to.
