6 ms·

Elderly Florida couple killed after their Tesla crashes into semi

73 points by crhulls 4y ago

kube-system 4y ago
Underride crashes are particularly nasty. I guess it’s probably a quick way to go, though. https://youtu.be/C3MPKLy9qHU https://youtu.be/C3MPKLy9qHU
- ec109685 4y ago
  Sad the standard isn’t upgraded to prevent the bar from breaking.
  - kube-system 4y ago
    Luckily the IIHS’s work is pretty influential. Here’s a follow up video: https://youtu.be/-VucNLZIsIU https://youtu.be/-VucNLZIsIU It’ll be decades before old designs are off the road though. And a good design only does so much.
    - ec109685 4y ago
      That’s great. Now I can’t stop looking at trailers and seeing which design they are employing.
    - l3_ 4y ago
      That video was 9 years ago, I wonder if the standards have been updated since then.
      - kube-system 4y ago
        The second video I linked is from 4 years ago and highlighted updated designs
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    Is there any indication the bar broke? It looks like it may have stayed in place and sliced through the car. In most other cars, it'd hit a dense engine before passengers; in a Tesla, that space is a trunk.
    - ec109685 4y ago
      In most cases, you don’t want a dense engine. The crumple zone in the Tesla is actually really effective since there is so much compressible space: https://electrek.co/2017/01/16/tesla-model-s-high-speed-crash-save-life/ https://electrek.co/2017/01/16/tesla-model-s-high-speed-cras... But you could be right that the Tesla’s crumple zone reinforcements didn't impact the bar.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      Engines are not crash structures in gasoline vehicles. It’s the frame rails that are designed to soften the impact. Having more empty space in front of the passengers actually makes it easier to dissipate energy over a longer period of distance/time before parts start to intrude on the passenger compartment.
  - KennyBlanken 4y ago
    The only reason it hasn't been updated is because the trucking industry has fought it tooth and nail. They want to use public infrastructure but can't "contribute" back by at least making their trucks not insanely deadly to everyone else. Those videos show a 35mph crash is basically a recipe for decapitating front passengers of a sedan. The distain truckers and the trucking industry have for the general public is disgusting. I've seen lots of trucks with giant spiked lugnuts - the only purpose of which is to shred the side of a passenger car if the trucker makes contact with said car. Literally weaponizing their vehicles.
- pjbk 4y ago
  That is the reason Mansfield bars were introduced, after Jayne Mansfield's accident that killed her and everyone else on the first row seat: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/uncategorized/vintage-review-1966-buick-electra-225-gm-banks-a-deuce-and-a-quarter https://www.curbsideclassic.com/uncategorized/vintage-review.... Incredible to think how her children on the back seat survived (including Mariska Hargitay).
- senectus1 4y ago
  what an ugly mess for first responders though.
ST2084 4y ago
- gurjeet 4y ago
  Involvement of Autopilot is not confirmed, yet. > … the authorities are looking into whether the automated features were involved in the crash.
- cypress66 4y ago
  What are you trying to say?
ec109685 4y ago
Really sad :( Unfortunately, this was on their 2015 hardware, which is much more limited and not upgradeable compared to their modern hardware: https://www.currentautomotive.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-tesla-autopilot/ https://www.currentautomotive.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-tesl...
- andbberger 4y ago
  jesus christ dude
lionkor 4y ago
> Highway Patrol Lt PV Riordan told the portal that the authorities are looking into whether the automated features were involved in the crash. The report further suggests that previous autopilot-related crashes were linked to the Teslas' cameras being confused by flashing lights and reflectors on stopped emergency vehicles A bit disingenuous to say that they dont know if the autopilot or any automated feature was involved AT ALL, and then proceed to insinuate that teslas cameras and autopilot are so bad, they might as well be responsible. Weird.
- formerkrogemp 4y ago
  > A bit disingenuous to say that they dont know if the autopilot or any automated feature was involved AT ALL, and then proceed to insinuate that teslas cameras and autopilot are so bad, they might as well be responsible. Oddly, NHTSA and others have noted that Fool Self Driving will cut itself off in case of impact or an accident, sometimes only a second before impact. Tesla can also kick drivers off of FSD Beta for opaque reasons, including for being a journalist. Several experts and users have noted the many flaws and errors with FSD. Weird. I for one don't appreciate being part of their testing program on public roads with drivers who take "Full Self Driving" at name value.
  - lionkor 4y ago
    I think you made a much better point than the article - it's being tested on everyone, not just people who opted in.
- fasthands9 4y ago
  I don't think it is disingenuous. The phenomenon he is talking about has happened before https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/tesla-on-autopilot-slammed-into-police-cars-despite-flashing-lights-lawsuit-says/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/tesla-on-autopil... I'm not going to claim to know how weird driver error can be - but if you look at the image of the crash scene it is extremely unusual. Would require very rapid accelerating in a parking lot and very high speeds.
- kube-system 4y ago
sixQuarks 4y ago
100,000 regular cars crash, no news. 1 Tesla crashes, plastered all over the news
- kube-system 4y ago
  Lots of cars have been in the news when it is suspected that defects have caused crashes. Pick a manufacturer and they’ve probably had a model marred by safety scandal.
- themitigating 4y ago
  Here's two major situations that the NHTSA was involved in that affected Ford, Toyota, Honda, and other non-Tesla companies ---- "On March 6, 2000, NHTSA began a preliminary inquiry and on May 2, NHTSA began an investigation (PE00-020) concerning the high incidence of tire failures and accidents of Ford Explorers and other light trucks and SUVs fitted with Firestone Radial ATX, ATX II, and Wilderness tires" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestone_and_Ford_tire_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestone_and_Ford_tire_contro... Which led to a massive loss for Ford and Firestone ---- A massive airbag recall due to corrosion in certain environments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takata_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takata_Corporation "On June 23, 2014, auto manufacturers BMW, Chrysler, Ford, Honda, Mazda, Nissan, and Toyota announced they were recalling over three million vehicles worldwide due to Takata Corporation-made airbags. The reason was that they could rupture and send debris flying inside the vehicle. This was in response to a US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation that was initiated after the NHTSA received three injury complaints." ----- Just because this is a current investigation and Elon Musk likes to play the victim while being one of the richest people in the world, doesn't mean there's some bias against Tesla.
  - Animats 4y ago
    Oh, that was huge. Airbags are normally powered by sodium azide. But, to reduce costs, Takata tried to use ordinary nitrate-based explosives, which are less stable. That did not end well.
    - 4y ago
pvg 4y ago
Yesterday, 51 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32039626 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32039626 Yesteryesteryesterday, 53 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32023337 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32023337
deleted 4y ago
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olivermarks 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago
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- seydor 4y ago
  Actually, Tesla's got Electrolytes, quite literally
  - olivermarks 4y ago
    Haha - perfect! https://youtu.be/kAqIJZeeXEc https://youtu.be/kAqIJZeeXEc
tempestn 4y ago
I was initially a bit confused as to how the crash occurred in a parking lot while the couple traveled southbound on an Interstate, but then noticed it's a parking lot of a rest stop, ie just off the side of the highway. I think this is it here: https://www.google.com/maps/search/Paynes+Prairie+rest+area/@29.5908003,-82.3642504,279m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/search/Paynes+Prairie+rest+area/...
- ralph84 4y ago
  And here is where the number 3 lane splits into two lanes. Definitely looks like the lane follow assist decided to keep right which put them in the exit lane for the rest stop. https://goo.gl/maps/txcPoS9HB8HbfPFS8 https://goo.gl/maps/txcPoS9HB8HbfPFS8
- pryce 4y ago
  I agree with your location contender: Google street view has recent pass in May 2022. I believe the two small, triangular lighter colored trees next to the two taller darker ones with exposed trunkes visible in the article photo are visible from here: https://goo.gl/maps/yXNWpyqy4RgpUChC7 https://goo.gl/maps/yXNWpyqy4RgpUChC7 Because the "two triangluar trees" in the photo are actually three trees (observe them from further north on southbound lane), we can line up the direction the photo was taken from almost exactly. The photo must almost certainly be on a line from the triangluar trees through here: https://goo.gl/maps/snxfWCeMXeKoNdWJ9 https://goo.gl/maps/snxfWCeMXeKoNdWJ9 (Google street view from the nearby of the southbound rest stop/lot itself -ie not from the southbound lane- is dated from 2011 so the trees are different) My own speculation: If that is the case, and given the history of "autopilot" being confused about white lines indicating that the car must surely be in the lane (eg driving right into wedges at offramps), It's possible the 'double offramp' design of the southbound parking lot/rest stop here would be particularly challenging for an automated system.
ocdtrekkie 4y ago
At 37 investigations, shouldn't we have these things pulled off the roads? At minimum, we should be demanding a update disabling Autopilot and FSD entirely to the entire fleet until the company's relatively rogue practices can be brought under control.
- zionic 4y ago
  As a Trekkie you should be asking for sample size. Odd that you’re not, and instead focusing on absolute numbers with millions of vehicles on the road
- grecy 4y ago
  > At 37 investigations, shouldn't we have these things pulled off the roads? Surely that would depend on the outcome of those investigations. If not we could just launch an investigation into every vehicle crash (~100 fatalities per day in the USA) and get all vehicles pulled off the road!
  - hetoh 4y ago
    I understand lot of Elon fans here , who think he’s Jesus… but even 1 death or accident due to a bad design or bug should have already forced Tesla into bankruptcy… you cannot beta test with peoples life .. proclaim its autopilot and safest system and then when someone dies because of it just explain it away what if comparison.. I have a Tesla and this exact scenario happened with me instead of being on the freeway it just took parallel exit road and was almost going to crash but I took over control very last second and avoided a horrible crash … I also reported it in NHTSA… so I have very little tolerance to anyone who wants to suck off Elon.. tell me one car company which had faulty software/hardware which are still running and are not forced to recall or fix the parts.. so stop will bullshit comparison of every car being pulled off road … Elon has been playing fast and loose with laws and I hope it catches up to him
    - thrill 4y ago
      "even 1 death or accident due to a bad design or bug should have already forced Tesla into bankruptcy" We'd still be riding horses with that approach ... except in today's society we'd be suing the owners of the horses' parents when a horse misbehaved.
ralph84 4y ago
A $15k econobox with automatic emergency braking can avoid a forward collision like this. No "autopilot" or "full self driving" required.
- deleted 4y ago
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CSMastermind 4y ago
Okay, I'm confused by this reporting. As far as I can tell the article posted got its information from a Daily Mail article which in turn doesn't cite a source. The related AP bulletin only says: > The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration confirmed Friday that it sent a Special Crash Investigations team to probe the Wednesday crash into the back of a semi-trailer at a rest area near Gainesville. The reason I find the article confusing is because, as mentioned in the article, the NHTSA already has an open investigation, moving towards a recall, into Tesla crashes related to autopilot. That investigation cited 37 cases where it appears the cars malfunctioned, both not prompting the driver and not taking preventative action like braking until it was too late to avoid the crash, and in some cases not at all. If you weren't following that story, a quick summary: - The government received 11 reports of Teslas striking first responders with autopilot engaged. - This prompted them to investigate all reports they had received about Tesla crashes involving autopilot, regardless of if a first responder was involved or not. - From the hundreds of crashes where this has happened, they went through and eliminated cases where something other than the technology played a role. This included things like the driver using the system in environments where it's not supported or the driver not reacting to vehicle prompts or the other driver being partially at fault or inclement weather or just not having enough data to draw a definitive conclusion. - After ruling out every case with these other factors in play they ended up with 37 cases that appeared to be vehicle malfunctions. Cases on the highway, with the system operating as intended, in clear weather conditions, with an apparently attentive driver, with other traffic behaving normally, where the car still crashed, did not take action to prevent the crash, and did not prompt the driver until it was too late for them to take evasion action (in some cases never prompting them at all). Original report here: https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/inv/2022/INOA-EA22002-3184.PDF https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/inv/2022/INOA-EA22002-3184.PDF It doesn't seem like this case in Florida has been added to that investigation yet. So what is this 37 number that they're reporting? Did they mean to say, "this could be similar to the other 37 cases" or by total coincidence is it referencing some other group of 37 crashes that the NHTSA is investigating? I'm confused but suspecting that the posted news article is just wrong. Somewhere (presumably the Daily Mail) a journalist searched to see how many times a crash like this has happened and the search for something like "NHTSA investigates tesla crash how many times" returned the ongoing investigation with 37 confirmed cases. Because to be clear: the NHTSA has investigated almost 400 Tesla autopilot crashes similar to this one and this one (as far as I can tell) has not been added to the engineering analysis they have open that has 37 other cases included in it. Of course if there's something I'm missing here I'd love for someone to clear it up.
DocTomoe 4y ago
Because it's Tesla and new, scary tech, this gets a lot of media attention. What I would be interested is a 'deaths by million person kilometers' grouped by manufacturer. I'd wager less automation means more deaths.
- interblag 4y ago
  This kind of point comes up a lot in these discussions. I'd suggest a slight alternative: "Death per million person kilometers, broken down by car age and road type." The expectation of death in modern cars during highway driving should be very low. Given that tools like Autopilot are only installed on new cars and only enabled in highway driving risks spurious comparisons if all miles of driving are treated equally...
  - divbzero 4y ago
    An article from 2018 [1] attempted an even stricter apples-to-apples comparison. The author’s estimates of fatality rates for Autopilot-driven Teslas vs. human-driven Teslas suggested that Autopilot was more deadly than human drivers but still the same order-of-magnitude. The author also called Musk’s comparison of Autopilot’s fatality rate to NHTSA’s fatality rate an “apples-to-aardvarks” comparison because NHTSA’s statistic includes bicycles, pedestrians, motorcycles, and buses. [1]: https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1119936_tesla-fatal-crash-rate-with-autopilot-still-no-better-than-with-human-drivers https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1119936_tesla-fatal-cra...
pcblues 4y ago
I dabble in image recognition. I could understand the signage on the back of the truck looked like an overhead sign much further away. This is the sort of whoops, sorry accidents ML will make. I'd still like to see a deaths by people driving normal cars/normal cars on the road vs. deaths in automatic cars/automatic cars on the road, by the hour on the road. If it's less than real drivers then I say charge on.
- BoorishBears 4y ago
  Is this satire?
  - teaearlgraycold 4y ago
  - bergenty 4y ago
    Why would it be? You can’t let a small handful of deaths grind progress to a halt especially when the alternative is the hundreds of thousands of deaths we see on the roads today. Take precautions, learn from mistakes but don’t shut everything down.
    - Hellion 4y ago
      Except, Tesla removed radar from their cars, a relatively inexpensive and simple mechanism that significantly reduce their fatality rate. It’s a false dichotomy here it’s frustrating, especially when they had implemented a check to their software and then removed it to save money on a $50,000 car
      - raducu 4y ago
        > Except, Tesla removed radar from their cars If I had to guess and be mean, even though I like Elon Musk, I'd say that was one of his directives; I liked watching Elon talk about rocket technology, but one day I stumbled about his ideas about software development at PayPall and it made me cringe.
olliej 4y ago
Is this the same one from the other day? As I understood it there wasn't any talk of autopilot being involved, beyond the obvious involvement of a Tesla? e.g. at the present time is there anything beyond brand that distinguishes this crash from someone crashing a ford or some such?
CasillasQT 4y ago
breaking news: car crash involving a tesla...

73 points by crhulls 4y ago

Underride crashes are particularly nasty. I guess it’s probably a quick way to go, though. https://youtu.be/C3MPKLy9qHU https://youtu.be/C3MPKLy9qHU

ec109685 4y ago
Sad the standard isn’t upgraded to prevent the bar from breaking.
- kube-system 4y ago
  Luckily the IIHS’s work is pretty influential. Here’s a follow up video: https://youtu.be/-VucNLZIsIU https://youtu.be/-VucNLZIsIU It’ll be decades before old designs are off the road though. And a good design only does so much.
  - ec109685 4y ago
    That’s great. Now I can’t stop looking at trailers and seeing which design they are employing.
  - l3_ 4y ago
    That video was 9 years ago, I wonder if the standards have been updated since then.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      The second video I linked is from 4 years ago and highlighted updated designs
- ceejayoz 4y ago
  Is there any indication the bar broke? It looks like it may have stayed in place and sliced through the car. In most other cars, it'd hit a dense engine before passengers; in a Tesla, that space is a trunk.
  - ec109685 4y ago
    In most cases, you don’t want a dense engine. The crumple zone in the Tesla is actually really effective since there is so much compressible space: https://electrek.co/2017/01/16/tesla-model-s-high-speed-crash-save-life/ https://electrek.co/2017/01/16/tesla-model-s-high-speed-cras... But you could be right that the Tesla’s crumple zone reinforcements didn't impact the bar.
  - kube-system 4y ago
    Engines are not crash structures in gasoline vehicles. It’s the frame rails that are designed to soften the impact. Having more empty space in front of the passengers actually makes it easier to dissipate energy over a longer period of distance/time before parts start to intrude on the passenger compartment.
- KennyBlanken 4y ago
  The only reason it hasn't been updated is because the trucking industry has fought it tooth and nail. They want to use public infrastructure but can't "contribute" back by at least making their trucks not insanely deadly to everyone else. Those videos show a 35mph crash is basically a recipe for decapitating front passengers of a sedan. The distain truckers and the trucking industry have for the general public is disgusting. I've seen lots of trucks with giant spiked lugnuts - the only purpose of which is to shred the side of a passenger car if the trucker makes contact with said car. Literally weaponizing their vehicles.
pjbk 4y ago
That is the reason Mansfield bars were introduced, after Jayne Mansfield's accident that killed her and everyone else on the first row seat: https://www.curbsideclassic.com/uncategorized/vintage-review-1966-buick-electra-225-gm-banks-a-deuce-and-a-quarter https://www.curbsideclassic.com/uncategorized/vintage-review.... Incredible to think how her children on the back seat survived (including Mariska Hargitay).
senectus1 4y ago
what an ugly mess for first responders though.

ST2084 4y ago

gurjeet 4y ago
Involvement of Autopilot is not confirmed, yet. > … the authorities are looking into whether the automated features were involved in the crash.
cypress66 4y ago
What are you trying to say?

ec109685 4y ago

Really sad :( Unfortunately, this was on their 2015 hardware, which is much more limited and not upgradeable compared to their modern hardware: https://www.currentautomotive.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-tesla-autopilot/ https://www.currentautomotive.com/the-ultimate-guide-to-tesl...

andbberger 4y ago
jesus christ dude

lionkor 4y ago

> Highway Patrol Lt PV Riordan told the portal that the authorities are looking into whether the automated features were involved in the crash. The report further suggests that previous autopilot-related crashes were linked to the Teslas' cameras being confused by flashing lights and reflectors on stopped emergency vehicles A bit disingenuous to say that they dont know if the autopilot or any automated feature was involved AT ALL, and then proceed to insinuate that teslas cameras and autopilot are so bad, they might as well be responsible. Weird.

formerkrogemp 4y ago
> A bit disingenuous to say that they dont know if the autopilot or any automated feature was involved AT ALL, and then proceed to insinuate that teslas cameras and autopilot are so bad, they might as well be responsible. Oddly, NHTSA and others have noted that Fool Self Driving will cut itself off in case of impact or an accident, sometimes only a second before impact. Tesla can also kick drivers off of FSD Beta for opaque reasons, including for being a journalist. Several experts and users have noted the many flaws and errors with FSD. Weird. I for one don't appreciate being part of their testing program on public roads with drivers who take "Full Self Driving" at name value.
- lionkor 4y ago
  I think you made a much better point than the article - it's being tested on everyone, not just people who opted in.
fasthands9 4y ago
I don't think it is disingenuous. The phenomenon he is talking about has happened before https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/tesla-on-autopilot-slammed-into-police-cars-despite-flashing-lights-lawsuit-says/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/tesla-on-autopil... I'm not going to claim to know how weird driver error can be - but if you look at the image of the crash scene it is extremely unusual. Would require very rapid accelerating in a parking lot and very high speeds.
kube-system 4y ago

sixQuarks 4y ago

100,000 regular cars crash, no news. 1 Tesla crashes, plastered all over the news

kube-system 4y ago
Lots of cars have been in the news when it is suspected that defects have caused crashes. Pick a manufacturer and they’ve probably had a model marred by safety scandal.
themitigating 4y ago
Here's two major situations that the NHTSA was involved in that affected Ford, Toyota, Honda, and other non-Tesla companies ---- "On March 6, 2000, NHTSA began a preliminary inquiry and on May 2, NHTSA began an investigation (PE00-020) concerning the high incidence of tire failures and accidents of Ford Explorers and other light trucks and SUVs fitted with Firestone Radial ATX, ATX II, and Wilderness tires" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestone_and_Ford_tire_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firestone_and_Ford_tire_contro... Which led to a massive loss for Ford and Firestone ---- A massive airbag recall due to corrosion in certain environments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takata_Corporation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takata_Corporation "On June 23, 2014, auto manufacturers BMW, Chrysler, Ford, Honda, Mazda, Nissan, and Toyota announced they were recalling over three million vehicles worldwide due to Takata Corporation-made airbags. The reason was that they could rupture and send debris flying inside the vehicle. This was in response to a US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation that was initiated after the NHTSA received three injury complaints." ----- Just because this is a current investigation and Elon Musk likes to play the victim while being one of the richest people in the world, doesn't mean there's some bias against Tesla.
- Animats 4y ago
  Oh, that was huge. Airbags are normally powered by sodium azide. But, to reduce costs, Takata tried to use ordinary nitrate-based explosives, which are less stable. That did not end well.
  - 4y ago

pvg 4y ago

Yesterday, 51 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32039626 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32039626 Yesteryesteryesterday, 53 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32023337 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32023337

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

olivermarks 4y ago

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
seydor 4y ago
Actually, Tesla's got Electrolytes, quite literally
- olivermarks 4y ago
  Haha - perfect! https://youtu.be/kAqIJZeeXEc https://youtu.be/kAqIJZeeXEc

tempestn 4y ago

I was initially a bit confused as to how the crash occurred in a parking lot while the couple traveled southbound on an Interstate, but then noticed it's a parking lot of a rest stop, ie just off the side of the highway. I think this is it here: https://www.google.com/maps/search/Paynes+Prairie+rest+area/@29.5908003,-82.3642504,279m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/search/Paynes+Prairie+rest+area/...

ralph84 4y ago
And here is where the number 3 lane splits into two lanes. Definitely looks like the lane follow assist decided to keep right which put them in the exit lane for the rest stop. https://goo.gl/maps/txcPoS9HB8HbfPFS8 https://goo.gl/maps/txcPoS9HB8HbfPFS8
pryce 4y ago
I agree with your location contender: Google street view has recent pass in May 2022. I believe the two small, triangular lighter colored trees next to the two taller darker ones with exposed trunkes visible in the article photo are visible from here: https://goo.gl/maps/yXNWpyqy4RgpUChC7 https://goo.gl/maps/yXNWpyqy4RgpUChC7 Because the "two triangluar trees" in the photo are actually three trees (observe them from further north on southbound lane), we can line up the direction the photo was taken from almost exactly. The photo must almost certainly be on a line from the triangluar trees through here: https://goo.gl/maps/snxfWCeMXeKoNdWJ9 https://goo.gl/maps/snxfWCeMXeKoNdWJ9 (Google street view from the nearby of the southbound rest stop/lot itself -ie not from the southbound lane- is dated from 2011 so the trees are different) My own speculation: If that is the case, and given the history of "autopilot" being confused about white lines indicating that the car must surely be in the lane (eg driving right into wedges at offramps), It's possible the 'double offramp' design of the southbound parking lot/rest stop here would be particularly challenging for an automated system.

ocdtrekkie 4y ago

At 37 investigations, shouldn't we have these things pulled off the roads? At minimum, we should be demanding a update disabling Autopilot and FSD entirely to the entire fleet until the company's relatively rogue practices can be brought under control.

zionic 4y ago
As a Trekkie you should be asking for sample size. Odd that you’re not, and instead focusing on absolute numbers with millions of vehicles on the road
grecy 4y ago
> At 37 investigations, shouldn't we have these things pulled off the roads? Surely that would depend on the outcome of those investigations. If not we could just launch an investigation into every vehicle crash (~100 fatalities per day in the USA) and get all vehicles pulled off the road!
- hetoh 4y ago
  I understand lot of Elon fans here , who think he’s Jesus… but even 1 death or accident due to a bad design or bug should have already forced Tesla into bankruptcy… you cannot beta test with peoples life .. proclaim its autopilot and safest system and then when someone dies because of it just explain it away what if comparison.. I have a Tesla and this exact scenario happened with me instead of being on the freeway it just took parallel exit road and was almost going to crash but I took over control very last second and avoided a horrible crash … I also reported it in NHTSA… so I have very little tolerance to anyone who wants to suck off Elon.. tell me one car company which had faulty software/hardware which are still running and are not forced to recall or fix the parts.. so stop will bullshit comparison of every car being pulled off road … Elon has been playing fast and loose with laws and I hope it catches up to him
  - thrill 4y ago
    "even 1 death or accident due to a bad design or bug should have already forced Tesla into bankruptcy" We'd still be riding horses with that approach ... except in today's society we'd be suing the owners of the horses' parents when a horse misbehaved.

ralph84 4y ago

A $15k econobox with automatic emergency braking can avoid a forward collision like this. No "autopilot" or "full self driving" required.

deleted 4y ago
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- deleted 4y ago
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CSMastermind 4y ago

Okay, I'm confused by this reporting. As far as I can tell the article posted got its information from a Daily Mail article which in turn doesn't cite a source. The related AP bulletin only says: > The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration confirmed Friday that it sent a Special Crash Investigations team to probe the Wednesday crash into the back of a semi-trailer at a rest area near Gainesville. The reason I find the article confusing is because, as mentioned in the article, the NHTSA already has an open investigation, moving towards a recall, into Tesla crashes related to autopilot. That investigation cited 37 cases where it appears the cars malfunctioned, both not prompting the driver and not taking preventative action like braking until it was too late to avoid the crash, and in some cases not at all. If you weren't following that story, a quick summary: - The government received 11 reports of Teslas striking first responders with autopilot engaged. - This prompted them to investigate all reports they had received about Tesla crashes involving autopilot, regardless of if a first responder was involved or not. - From the hundreds of crashes where this has happened, they went through and eliminated cases where something other than the technology played a role. This included things like the driver using the system in environments where it's not supported or the driver not reacting to vehicle prompts or the other driver being partially at fault or inclement weather or just not having enough data to draw a definitive conclusion. - After ruling out every case with these other factors in play they ended up with 37 cases that appeared to be vehicle malfunctions. Cases on the highway, with the system operating as intended, in clear weather conditions, with an apparently attentive driver, with other traffic behaving normally, where the car still crashed, did not take action to prevent the crash, and did not prompt the driver until it was too late for them to take evasion action (in some cases never prompting them at all). Original report here: https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/inv/2022/INOA-EA22002-3184.PDF https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/inv/2022/INOA-EA22002-3184.PDF It doesn't seem like this case in Florida has been added to that investigation yet. So what is this 37 number that they're reporting? Did they mean to say, "this could be similar to the other 37 cases" or by total coincidence is it referencing some other group of 37 crashes that the NHTSA is investigating? I'm confused but suspecting that the posted news article is just wrong. Somewhere (presumably the Daily Mail) a journalist searched to see how many times a crash like this has happened and the search for something like "NHTSA investigates tesla crash how many times" returned the ongoing investigation with 37 confirmed cases. Because to be clear: the NHTSA has investigated almost 400 Tesla autopilot crashes similar to this one and this one (as far as I can tell) has not been added to the engineering analysis they have open that has 37 other cases included in it. Of course if there's something I'm missing here I'd love for someone to clear it up.

DocTomoe 4y ago

Because it's Tesla and new, scary tech, this gets a lot of media attention. What I would be interested is a 'deaths by million person kilometers' grouped by manufacturer. I'd wager less automation means more deaths.

interblag 4y ago
This kind of point comes up a lot in these discussions. I'd suggest a slight alternative: "Death per million person kilometers, broken down by car age and road type." The expectation of death in modern cars during highway driving should be very low. Given that tools like Autopilot are only installed on new cars and only enabled in highway driving risks spurious comparisons if all miles of driving are treated equally...
- divbzero 4y ago
  An article from 2018 [1] attempted an even stricter apples-to-apples comparison. The author’s estimates of fatality rates for Autopilot-driven Teslas vs. human-driven Teslas suggested that Autopilot was more deadly than human drivers but still the same order-of-magnitude. The author also called Musk’s comparison of Autopilot’s fatality rate to NHTSA’s fatality rate an “apples-to-aardvarks” comparison because NHTSA’s statistic includes bicycles, pedestrians, motorcycles, and buses. [1]: https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1119936_tesla-fatal-crash-rate-with-autopilot-still-no-better-than-with-human-drivers https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1119936_tesla-fatal-cra...

pcblues 4y ago

I dabble in image recognition. I could understand the signage on the back of the truck looked like an overhead sign much further away. This is the sort of whoops, sorry accidents ML will make. I'd still like to see a deaths by people driving normal cars/normal cars on the road vs. deaths in automatic cars/automatic cars on the road, by the hour on the road. If it's less than real drivers then I say charge on.

BoorishBears 4y ago
Is this satire?
- teaearlgraycold 4y ago
- bergenty 4y ago
  Why would it be? You can’t let a small handful of deaths grind progress to a halt especially when the alternative is the hundreds of thousands of deaths we see on the roads today. Take precautions, learn from mistakes but don’t shut everything down.
  - Hellion 4y ago
    Except, Tesla removed radar from their cars, a relatively inexpensive and simple mechanism that significantly reduce their fatality rate. It’s a false dichotomy here it’s frustrating, especially when they had implemented a check to their software and then removed it to save money on a $50,000 car
    - raducu 4y ago
      > Except, Tesla removed radar from their cars If I had to guess and be mean, even though I like Elon Musk, I'd say that was one of his directives; I liked watching Elon talk about rocket technology, but one day I stumbled about his ideas about software development at PayPall and it made me cringe.

olliej 4y ago

Is this the same one from the other day? As I understood it there wasn't any talk of autopilot being involved, beyond the obvious involvement of a Tesla? e.g. at the present time is there anything beyond brand that distinguishes this crash from someone crashing a ford or some such?

CasillasQT 4y ago

breaking news: car crash involving a tesla...