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Surveillance Footage of Tesla Crash on SF’s Bay Bridge

132 points by atchoo 4y ago

markisus 4y ago
The Tesla should not have stopped but there is a cultural problem of driving way too close to the car in front of you. There are other justified scenarios why a car would have had to slam on the brakes at that same spot and the pileup would have still occurred.
- platzhirsch 4y ago
  This. After having moved from Germany to California I was astonished with how little safety gap folks leave between each other on the freeway. In Germany we are taught to keep a lot more gap because the time it takes to break or react will eat up a lot of distance. The last time I pointed this out I was told: well, I can still steer to the side if that happens.
  - kccqzy 4y ago
    I did not see any emergency stopping lane on this stretch of the road. You would bump onto the narrow pedestrian walkway. So those people were wrong. We absolutely should keep more safety gap.
- a_cardboard_box 4y ago
  In this case the Tesla slammed on the brakes and changed lanes, so there wasn't a realistic way for the other car to prevent the collision.
  - newaccount74 4y ago
    Curiously the vehicle behind the Tesla barely hit it whereas the drivers of the cars further back in the pileup seemed to have paid less attention. There would have been multiple ways for the cars further back to prevent a pileup: Drive slower, keep more distance. If you speed, have both hands on the wheel, look at the road, and be ready to brake quickly. It does sound like there were no severe injuries, so you could argue that people kept enough distance to avoid serious injuries.
    - godelski 4y ago
      There are lighting conditions that could play a role here since this was when people were entering the tunnel. This might also be something that freaked out the Tesla. But it is hard to know without being in the situation.
    - deleted 4y ago
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    - creato 4y ago
      Even if all the vehicles following each had the same following distance and reaction time, each of them is going to encounter a vehicle stopping more quickly than the one in front of them did. So even if everyone performs similarly, the cars at the back are going to hit harder.
    - hanche 4y ago
      It’s really hard to tell, but to me it looks like the one behind that one managed to stop in time. But only with the tiniest margin. Action further back was much more dramatic, that’s for sure.
  - markisus 4y ago
    You're right. The first rear-ending may have been unavoidable. However, you can see from the rear surveillance camera that subsequent vehicles could have stopped if everyone agreed to keep larger following distances. As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, there is the game-theoretical issue of other drivers cutting in when large gaps form so it would take some coordination on a technology / policy / cultural level to resolve the issue.
    - svnpenn 4y ago
      > drivers cutting in when large gaps form if they do, so what? even if 10 people cut in front of you, with a 30 minute drive, how much time are you really losing? 50 seconds?
    - Dudelander 4y ago
      That's just not true. The two cars behind that one were well more than two car lengths apart. Following too close is a non-sequitur.
      - jws 4y ago
        Unless they are going under 13mph, two car lengths is too close.
        hallway_monitor 4y ago
        I have always heard you should keep two seconds between cars. So at 20mph, you are 60 feet apart. At 60mph you are 180 feet apart.
        sidibe 4y ago
        In any case they stopped successfully, it was the ones behind them that pushed them forward.
    - roughly 4y ago
      The Tesla changed lanes and instantly became a stopped object. The car that hit it did the same, and so did every subsequent car. The follow distance to avoid a collision at that point is about 10 car lengths, or roughly the average stopping distance.
  - econonut 4y ago
    The Tesla looks like it slowed down 200+ feet over 4 seconds. That's far from slamming on the brakes. It's also, however, very far from expected behavior which could explain why the drivers behind didn't slow down enough in time. They weren't expecting the Tesla to come to a complete stop. I'd guess if the other car was a Tesla it probably would have stopped in time to prevent the collision because it's basing its decisions on the environment not based on prior experience driving in that particular spot. I'd also argue that the Tesla pulling over into the left lane (merge 1 lane left vs 3 lanes to the right) is the right behavior in a situation that warrants stopping. Try to get to the side of the road so other cars can pass.
    - ruined 4y ago
      that is, in fact, slamming on the brakes. your estimate of 200+ft over 4 seconds, assuming perhaps a low highway speed of 60mph, is faster than many cars are capable of stopping, even assuming zero reaction time.
  - Spooky23 4y ago
    It's ok, the car may have cut people off and caused an accident, but if you look at it on the basis of the the number of fatalities/mile, cutting off and causing a minor accident is no big deal. Clearly keeping Tesla's stock price up is a bigger deal.
  - quantified 4y ago
    It's cars 3,4,5 or 4,5,6 that really hit hard. Coming to a full stop in the left lane is really last-resort stuff. That is the speed/passing lane (in most jurisdictions, all lands are speed/passing around the Bay Area and especially on the bridges).
- cjbgkagh 4y ago
  It's one of those things where if you don't close the gap you'll get other cars constantly trying to jump into it. Same with not speeding, you'll get overtaken constantly. Tends to make things more dangerous for you. I'm not sure what the answer is. It'll be hard to generate a consensus without some major policing.
  - peter422 4y ago
    If you are driving in the "slow" lanes this is not the case. I generally cruise in the right or second to right lane with a large gap in front of me and it is certainly not more dangerous. Certainly faster traffic is passing on my left but not in a way that impacts me.
  - deleted 4y ago
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  - godelski 4y ago
    I'm surprised this isn't higher up. I think a lot of people retcon their safe driving behaviors to what they learned in a driving test but not to what they do in practice. Or maybe a lot of people answering haven't driven in major cities? But yeah, drive in LA and see how long you can keep 3+ car lengths in front of you. I hate driving in LA.
  - amf12 4y ago
    > It's one of those things where if you don't close the gap you'll get other cars constantly trying to jump into it. In general I am ok with people merging in the gap, but some people are assholes about it by merging too close to me that I have to brake. I don't understand why people merge when they know the person behind in the other lane will have to slow down to let them merge.
    - cjbgkagh 4y ago
      You have to keep slowing down to maintain the gap which causes more problems.
      - 4y ago
- techdmn 4y ago
  I haven't read statute, but my understanding has always been that if you run into the car in front of you, it is your fault, period. If you didn't have time to stop, you are "Following too close for conditions", regardless of what those conditions are. I agree that culturally a lot of people in such situations say "It's not my fault, they stopped right in front of me!", but as you correctly point out, there are legitimate reasons for someone to come to a sudden stop, and as a driver it is YOUR responsibility to make sure you are ready for that possibility.
  - cjbgkagh 4y ago
    You get situations of people backing into you which looks like you ran into them. I think it's on the absence of other evidence the car with front damage is presumed guilty but if you have additional evidence like a dashcam you can challenge that presumption.
    - candiodari 4y ago
      You can easily tell this situation from the tire marks.
    - dylan604 4y ago
      In that situation, the person did not get hit from the rear. They hit someone with their rear.
      - cjbgkagh 4y ago
        Good luck proving that without evidence. You can see a number of youtube videos of people trying to perpetuate break checks as an insurance scam. Sometimes break checking alone doesn't work so they reverse into you. Relying too hard on simple heuristics creates these problems and additional evidence such as dash cams can help.
    - sorum 4y ago
      It's one of the reasons we have dashcams in both our cars. Added bonus is that if you witness an incident, the police is very happy when you can send them the video file to prove how it all happened.
- bdcravens 4y ago
  Humans drive in that world, and while these accidents still occur, typically are able to respond, as we have far better sensors and processing power.
- pleb_nz 4y ago
  I couldn't watch the video so can't comment directly on this case but it boggles the mind how close people follow others on the road. The distance you have between you and the car in front on you is one of the only safety zones you can control on the road. People should cherish it and let it blossom into wide open space. You often have no control over the left, right and rear. Why would you want to take away that front space as well?
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    aside, people drive somewhat close in the bay area, but also in my experience it's so much worse in both LA and in Austin, and in TX so many of them are 6000lb Ford F150s.
    - godelski 4y ago
      In LA if you try to have distance someone will fill in the spot. I've experienced this in the Bay too. While I agree with many of these comments about people driving too close, I think it ends up being too simple and naive to real world conditions. This behavior tends to be true in any major city but not so outside.
      - maerF0x0 4y ago
        Yeah I understand the "fill the spot" issue all too well. This is a behavior that our police/legal system is failing to address adequately. The emergent behavior is not the safe, legal, or even optimal behavior for traffic flow/reduction (afaik). But as I've observed in America, it's more about getting 1 car ahead of others than it is about having optimal outcomes across a large proportion of all traffic.
        godelski 4y ago
        I have a hypothesis that this is another emergent pattern. I drive a lot between WA, OR, and CA. One thing I notice is that in OR I can easily pass people AND that if I'm in the left lane approaching someone there's a fairly high likelihood that they move right. Maybe 1 in 10 people don't move. But once I hit California I end up zig zagging much more, passing people who are in the left lane going below the speed limit (especially in central California). But I don't think the probability changed, but rather the population. Oregon is easier to rive in than Washington which is easier to drive in than California. I'm pretty sure this is just a small number of bad actors who are a constant percentage and their effects scale (probably also providing a feedback loop). I try to slightly combat this by calling the left most lane the "passing lane" rather than the "fast lane." A lot of people treat the left lane like kids treat lightup shoes: they think it makes them go faster. And don't get me started on elephant racing. I frequently wonder the economic and environmental impact of just this singular type of event in central California.
- flibbityflob 4y ago
  I think if the Tesla had been avoiding a hazard, there would be a lot more gray area for FSD to hide in. It’s true that sudden braking and swerving is sometimes the least-bad thing for a driver to do, but if a human driver showed a pattern of repeatedly performing that maneuver for no reason, at some point a reasonable person would have to conclude that that driver is at least partly at fault for the inevitable crash that happens.
- ProAm 4y ago
  Did the driver have his hand on the the controls at the time of the accident? FSD = Faulty Self Driving or Fairly Self Driving or Fully Stopped Driving.
- Dudelander 4y ago
  That was absolutely not the case in this accident. The Tesla swerved in front of the car in the next lane and then suddenly slammed on the breaks. The two cars behind that one were driving several car lengths back. There was no way for this accident to involve less than 4 cars.
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    False. There exists a following distance and amount of paying attention that would have involved 0 cars hitting the tesla. If you look really closely at it at least 3 cars (maybe 4) stopped with next to no incident (it's not discernible if they even touched). It's the 5th or 6th car that shoves everyone into everyone else (and quite dramatically gets under the car infront of them and pops them up)
    - SrslyJosh 4y ago
      The Tesla changed lanes and came to a stop in the middle of a bridge for no reason. Would you make excuses for a human that did that while conscious and not in any kind of distress?
      - maerF0x0 4y ago
        > that while conscious and not in any kind of distress? I'd be less understanding, yes. But at this point it's presumable that the autopilot was in "distress" (avoiding a perceived issue). And when such a thing comes up, real or false, the drivers behind need to be ready to react. And several of the cars did so quite well actually. The only reason this is a dramatic incident is because of the like 5th or 6th car that hits everyone else hard.
    - timeon 4y ago
      Not sure how it is in SF. But I have noticed too many people on highway looking at their phones (even if it is illegal). On the other side I do not understand why this 'Autopilot' is not banned from the public roads.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  Yes, exactly! tire blow out would have caused the exact same scenario (or worse). Would the headline be "Michelin causes 8 car crash just after rubber contract with Brazil" ? The title is completely unfair to Tesla.
  - robofanatic 4y ago
    I guess its because Tesla is almost synonymous to "self driving car"
  - deleted 4y ago
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  - ncr100 4y ago
    That's not this situation. It's fair to assume "full self driving" will continue driving, rather than change lanes into an occupied lane, and stop abruptly. It should have slowed gradually. It's Tesla's fault.
    - maerF0x0 4y ago
      The design flaw is Tesla's fault, yes. The chain reaction is not. And it's not fair to blame the design flaw for 8 cars. At most 1, but we see that 1 behind it actually more or less stopped.
- cacozen 4y ago
  This argument bears a lot of resemblance with victim-blaming phrases, like: “She shouldn’t have been raped, but did you see the dress she was wearing on a dark street?”
  - amf12 4y ago
    Its not even remotely close. Women have a right to wear what they want without being raped for it. People don't have to drive dangerously too close and expect to not get in an accident.
    - ncr100 4y ago
      Not my understanding of this situation ..they pulled into another occupied lane and hit the brakes...so neither generalization is so simple a case to support.
      - abenga 4y ago
        This is true for the first car that hit the Tesla but not any of the others behind that.
- dieselgate 4y ago
  I agree with that but it seems like the Tesla basically cut off the driver to their left while changing lanes (while signaling) but also coming to a stop. Really weird behavior to see, of course, but this honestly doesn't seem like much of a "safe driving distance" thing to me.
- vl 4y ago
  The irony, of course, if other cars would have been software-driven they would just safely stop. I’ve been in the situation when Tesla auto breaking saved the car from crush, which was similar situation to this.
  - ncr100 4y ago
    Lol. Ironic, truly, and likely the excuse made by Musk. He shipped a car which is Not designed for Today.
- ncr100 4y ago
  "But" nothing. This is a Technology Failure. Whomever worked on this software should face consequences. Hitting the brakes in the tunnel for no reason is a "never to this" kind of move. "But [...] other scenarios" is not the situation here. There is no escaped pet anaconda slithering across the tunnel floor. There's no Godzilla breathing fire inside the tunnel. It's just a car with no obstructions in front of it, none visible to any other drivers, and it's choosing to hit the brakes. There is no excuse. It's at the bottom of a downhill slope. There's a limited view of what's up ahead because the slope starts to incline inside that tunnel. Cars start to speed up. There is typically a massive amount of traffic on the bridge. Blame Tesla, full throatedly.
- cycomanic 4y ago
  > shows a Tesla Model S vehicle changing lanes and then abruptly braking in the far-left lane of the San Francisco Bay Bridge While it is true that there is a culture of following to closely, I don't think it applies here. When a car merges into your lane you should not abruptly change your speed to adjust the distance, but slowly increase it. Otherwise you get huge ripple effects and people 1km back will essentially be in stop and go mode.
  - nrb 4y ago
    The video is literally evidence of the effects of following too closely. From the back angle, there are 4 vehicles starting with the white truck in the leftmost lane that pass through within 1.5 seconds; a few are only a few hundred milliseconds apart! If you switch back to the front view you see that’s exactly the cluster that piles up onto the safety braked vehicles ahead of them, because the white truck they’ve been tailgating has swerved into a moving lane and exposed the stopped traffic. Everyone beside perhaps the first car that had an incursion into its lane (but arguably failed to reduce speed to avoid an accident with a vehicle braking and signaling their lane) are WAY too close for the speed. Any speed reductions in those lanes would necessitate heavy braking which would cause exactly the ripple effects you’re referring to under normal conditions because there’s no buffer whatsoever to gradually reduce speed/increase distance either.
- iJohnDoe 4y ago
  It’s seems like everyone that has a Tesla - Drives way too close to other cars (tailgating). Drives way too fast all time, even in neighborhoods. Drives way too aggressive. Drives way too entitled. I’ve seen some crazy stuff from people driving a Tesla. Driving on the shoulder when traffic backs up. Zipping around people to steal parking spots.
darknavi 4y ago
A great example of how FSD/Autopilot is hugely flawed today. The car just does not give you clear indications of when or _why_ it is slowing down/swerving erratically in the lane when nothing is around. I get that about once a week. This is 100% the drivers fault though, it is extremely easy to override Autopilot. Tap the brakes will disable the entire system, press the accelerator will keep lane keeping on but override the speed, and moving the steering wheel will disable lane keeping but keep cruise control on.
- andrewmunsell 4y ago
  More often than not, I have my foot on the accelerator and not the brake when I am using AP. I don't drive a lot in general, but over the tens of thousands of miles on AP I had it hit the brakes hard enough to be a problem only once. It's definitely randomly slowed down many times, but with your foot on the accelerator it's very easy to override before it drops more than a couple MPH. Now, I've also heard people say that the phantom braking issue can be really violent and so it's very possible I've just never experienced true phantom braking, but based on how many of the drivers behind the initial wreck slammed into each other it's clear many folks do not pay enough attention or leave enough following distance to be safe.
  - ncr100 4y ago
    Good data point. In this case it looks like the car not only breaks ... but it turned into an occupied lane. Then it stopped. It didn't stop gradually either. So I don't see how this is correct behavior on part of autopilot.
    - katbyte 4y ago
      or even turn on hazards. it just signalled and stopped.
- methehack 4y ago
  Given your description, I'm surprised you, or any responsible driver, would keep using the feature. It sounds really dangerous.
francisofascii 4y ago
Vehicles unfortunately have to come to a stop all the time on a highway for various reasons. This is clearly due the cars going too fast and too close from behind.
- vngzs 4y ago
  It is exceedingly abnormal to come to a complete stop in the far left lane.
- amf12 4y ago
  > This is clearly due the cars going too fast and too close from behind. This is due to both - buggy software being tested on public roads and people going too fast and driving close behind. The first two collisions couldn't have been avoided because of how abrupt Tesla changed the lane and stopped, thats on Tesla.
dzader 4y ago
Is this what happens when the driver ignores the steering wheel nag warning? I've never let mine get to that point but I think the car pulls over and stops? (Not saying what the Tesla did here was ok just curious if that's what it was doing)
- abracadaniel 4y ago
  In just autopilot, I don't think it actually pulls over. I tried it once, and it put on the hazard lights and began to coast to a stop. I was able to just turn off the hazards and use the pedal to resume driving as normal, so you can override at any time. It does penalize you by preventing you from turning AP back on during that drive.
  - dzader 4y ago
    ah interesting. I guess the lack of hazards here might indicate this wasn't a case of the driver ignoring the warnings. They should have been ready to hit the gas regardless.
  - boring_twenties 4y ago
    Venturing off-topic here but I can't imagine owning a vehicle that sees fit to "penalize" me as if it's my parent or credit card issuer rather than an inanimate object I own to use as I see fit.
    - skellera 4y ago
      If Tesla doesn’t, people would do dumb stuff and the government would end up playing parent. But that said, it’s fine. People who feel that way should not buy a Tesla or, if they do, don’t use AP. Free market and all that.
- skellera 4y ago
  Driver was obviously not paying attention. How does someone notice their car braking significantly and not just press the accelerator to counter it? AP will disengage the brake at that point. I think it’s made extremely clear that you need to be paying attention during FSD/AP. Car may have partial blame for doing something unexpected but driver didn’t do anything to get out of that situation.
xxpor 4y ago
>Teslas accounted for almost 70 percent of 329 crashes in which advanced driver assistance systems were involved, as well as a majority of fatalities and serious injuries associated with them, the data shows. This is pretty disingenuous given that I believe Teslas have probably covered by far the most miles with an "advanced driver assistance system". The Tesla definitely screwed up here, and I'm not sure you could have prevented the initial crash, but the pile up behind it is entirely the other drivers' fault.
- pugworthy 4y ago
  ...I'm not sure you could have prevented the initial crash, but the pile up behind it is entirely the other drivers' fault. If other drivers should have seen and avoided the pileup, then it seems reasonable that the Tesla driver should have seen the unexpected braking and overridden it. In both cases, humans failed to react fast enough to something that required active focus and fast, split-second reaction.
  - xxpor 4y ago
    Expecting the person in front of you to brake suddenly is (supposed to be) a normal part of driving.
- flutas 4y ago
  > This is pretty disingenuous given that I believe Teslas have probably covered by far the most miles with an "advanced driver assistance system". On top of that most other manufacturers don't have telemetry about it either and instead rely on dealerships to collect that information. > The Tesla definitely screwed up here, and I'm not sure you could have prevented the initial crash, but the pile up behind it is entirely the other drivers' fault. I'm still confused about the whole situation. Police report mentions FSD v11, which is only for employees so far. FSD v11 is what makes the freeway "FSD", otherwise it's their old "we go straight in lane, maybe take exit or change lane" code...which wouldn't be FSD. So either an employee crashed with internal only versions, or the police and owner are just incompetent about what they actually have.
- kryptiskt 4y ago
bjornlouser 4y ago
In the second video the Tesla seems to stop short of the heavy shadow cast on the road. Guess it thought it was approaching a barrier of some sort...
- andiareso 4y ago
  You might be on to something there. I wonder if it was a vision-only version. Anecdotally, my wife and I used FSD out in Oregon while on vacation a year ago and had these these "phantom brakes" occur two times on the same stretch of road. It was very sunny day through the gorge to Hood River from Portland and I'm thinking there definitely would have been sharp contrasting shadows from the trees and sunlight.
- m463 4y ago
  can't help but think: optical can't do everything
danso 4y ago
Is it possible that this is the result of the driver ignoring the attention "nags"? Seems more plausible than FSD having a brain fart (unless many other FSD Teslas are making that same decision in that same spot). But even so, is Tesla's fail-mode really that unsophisticated? Pulling off into the left lane, even if it's the nearest off-lane, seems problematic, especially if it's in front of another vehicle who is at full speed b/c it had (until that moment) a clear road. I don't expect FSD to be able to find its way to a proper rest stop or off-ramp, but seems like a less dramatic shutdown mode should be possible, e.g. driving a couple of miles at moderate speed until there's a safer pull-off opportunity.
- jws 4y ago
  e.g. driving a couple of miles at moderate speed until there's a safer pull-off opportunity I'm fairly certain this isn't a legal option in the United States. That would be unattended self driving. It's probably a better solution, it just isn't available.
  - danso 4y ago
    It is strange that if it is the case of driver-inattention-disengagement, that the Tesla wouldn't at least put on hazard lights. Maybe it wouldn't be enough in this situation, but in most cases, it would be a more obvious signal that the left lane change is an emergency maneuver.
    - jws 4y ago
      I haven’t looked at my tail lights, but in the US most cars have used the same bulb for hazard and brake. So the bulbs are already fully illuminated. Cars meant for the rest of the world have separate yellow lights in back and you could flash those. I think they are adding a rapid burst flash for alert with those.
beckingz 4y ago
Gotta appreciate the cars behind that just keep running into the mess.
- Krisjohn 4y ago
  It’s the visibility problem at the entrance to a tunnel. While you’re in the bright light, it’s harder to see into the shadow. I know that theoretically you should slow down, but practically nobody does, so it’s unsafe to suddenly break during a brief loss of visibility, as demonstrated.
maerF0x0 4y ago
> TESLA CRASH ON SF’S BAY BRIDGE > resulting in an eight-vehicle crash I'm sorry, but this is an 8 vehicle pile up from people following too close (or paying too little attention). At least where I'm from if you run into the back of a car it's your fault. It means you followed too close, failed to react to a situation in front of you. Should the car have stopped there, no? But is it that car's fault that others ran into the back of it? No.
- advisedwang 4y ago
  The Tesla changed lanes with very little clearance to the car behind it and then immediately braked. The first car that rear-ended the Tesla could not have avoided the accident short of mind-reading.
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    And the car behind it braked with minimal impact (hard to tell, but you dont see the tesla jump in any major way like the subsequent cars do)... So it didn't completely cut off the car behind it. > short of mind-reading. This is called defensive driving and it involves running "what if scenarios" and being prepared for even those. "What if the tesla has a tire blow out and comes in my lane" Is something that can be thought of any brand of car.
- urda 4y ago
  It absolutely is the Tesla's fault for coming to an illegal stop in response to no event ahead of them during a lane change which is clearly demonstrated in video. The rest of your comment is approaching victim blaming. The Tesla is 100% at fault here.
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    It's never illegal to stop in reaction to a perceived dangerous situation.
    - urda 4y ago
candyman 4y ago
Seems like a very strange move. The Tesla seems to signal a lane change and abruptly slow down at the same time on a highway with no lights, intersections, turns, or obstacles. This was precisely the type of driving I figured would be easy to automate - rather than deal with urban settings, pedestrians, bicycles, etc.
- Someone1234 4y ago
  Tesla's systems sometimes see phantom obstacles (e.g. shadows or reflections). Trying to change lanes away from them and then braking when they cannot isn't unusual at all. One of the reasons it is surprising regulators let this "beta" test be conducted on public roads with other drivers who weren't asked nor agreed to the disclaimers.
  - roughly 4y ago
    > Tesla's systems sometimes see phantom obstacles (e.g. shadows or reflections) Shame they don’t have LiDAR or some other form of actual distance/range sensing.
    - m463 4y ago
      yet they have radar and 12 long-range sonar sensors
      - GaryNumanVevo 4y ago
        They actually removed the radar and ultrasonic sensors for model years 2021 and onward.
- ModernMech 4y ago
  The problem of driving a robot straight through a corridor while avoiding obstacles is Robotics 101 stuff. With the right sensors. This scenario calls for long rang distance detection, which is the natural wheelhouse of LIDAR. Unfortunately, Tesla seems to have something to prove when it comes to LIDAR, and stubbornly refuses to adopt the technology, despite crashes and even deaths that have occurred, and general industry understanding that it's the enabling technology for driverless cars. Is it legal to create a two-ton machine with admittedly beta-quality software, and a sensor stack that is known to be insufficient; and allow it to autonomous roam around town, crashing into things and killing their drivers? Apparently that is fine in the eyes of the law. Is it unethical? Society seems to be deliberating this one. I hear a lot of "the ends justify the means" style thinking in this area. Either way, this should embarrass the hell out of Tesla engineers. I used to feel sorry for them, but it's been long enough that they should know better.
taldo 4y ago
Comments mention driving too close to the car in front, or too fast, but I'd like to bring attention to distracted drivers. You can see how late the 4th-8th car apply the brakes, and quite reluctantly too. The first couple of cars behind the Tesla did crash but at a pretty low speed, I'd say not even at airbag-deploying speed. But the 6-7th end up hitting the pileup at a good 40-50mph.
- zahma 4y ago
  The paramount issue here is that the software isn't operating as intended. Reckless driving and distracted driving are compounding issues to that major concern. Rather than dismissing the accident as possible with a driver fully in control, distracted and reckless driving are great reasons why we shouldn't entrust auto-pilot software to public consumption yet.
  - taldo 4y ago
    Agreed that FSD is crap and shouldn't be available to the public. Maybe it's okay to be tested out in the public by professional drivers, paid to do that, and monitored for attention/alertness, much like Waymo did for oh-so-long (and Uber didn't before the infamous 2018 accident). BUT... that Tesla could've been a student driver mistaking the brakes for the gas pedal, or a car running out of gas, or somebody passing out, or any number of other plausible circumstances where a car just stops in the left lane for no apparent reason.
zahma 4y ago
Enough is enough. Stop using the public as testing grounds for software development and marketing defunct wares. If tech is meant to bring us the utopia we all need but don't know we want, the least that these companies who exploit public space can do is to get some ethics before someone does die. As if it isn't enough that a multi-car pile up won't ruin some people's days and waste so much time dealing with insurance, why are we expected to put up with this in the name of "progress?" I also don't accept the argument that human are imperfect drivers, so it's OK if Tesla's shit software is placed at the hands of experienced drivers. People are not good at driving, and that's exactly why we don't need to enable our stupidity in a high-speed death box. Even if someone is a good driver, the tendency to relax when you are told that you don't need to be totally poised for action is a great way to delay response time, so I'd expect this to happen 99/100 with the best drivers in the world. In a situation with a relaxed driver, there's no humanly possible response time that's going to prevent this crash from happening. Tesla ought not proffer software that is anything less than perfect and expect the public to fill in the holes. It's clear that drivers today are less patient, more distracted, and less competent all while embattled with environmental distractions. And as if it isn't hard enough to monitor 360 degrees, now I need to focus on which kind of car is in my area? In some places, it's not even possible to avoid this kind of collision. I can only imagine what would happen on I-40 in Raleigh or I-95. That's truly frightening. I drive a Tesla and actually really enjoy the car, but I still get phantom braking issues, albeit the car does not fully brake and change lanes. Thank goodness I turned all of those features off. And that leads me to think that Tesla knows they have kinks to iron out. With all the data that they collect, they must have known accidents like this could happen and still put their product out. I want to see criminal charges, fines, and a Congressional investigation leading to legislation. What's the price of a life, Mr. Musk? Would you put your kids in one of your cars, turn on auto-pilot, and expect them to make it from Point A to Point B each and every time?
- freedomben 4y ago
  0 mistakes seems like a pretty extremist and impossible standard. If that standard had been applied to automobiles before they could be driven on roads, we'd still have horse and buggy everywhere and we'd be dealing with catastrophic amounts of horse shit on all the city streets
SrslyJosh 4y ago
Man, I had no idea there were so many HNers with strong opinions on highway follow distance. rolls eyes
whiplash451 4y ago
NATFB (not a tesla fan boy) but isn’t there an inherent bias towards reporting and exploiting FSD’s faulty behaviors vs reporting the times where it saved butts?
- danso 4y ago
  Elevators undoubtedly save lives over time, but it's a lot harder to count how many heart attacks didn't happen vs. how many people were suddenly crushed to death. But if an elevator ran perfectly for years at a time but also could, at any moment, instantly and inexplicably kill its occupants — it's still every important to understand why there's a flaw in the automation. In any case, how would you measure when FSD/AP "saved butts"? Every driver is expected to operate the systems with the same ability and awareness to manually intervene (i.e. save themselves) as if the automation wasn't in place.
  - whiplash451 4y ago
    > In any case, how would you measure when FSD/AP "saved butts"? I would not know how to measure it, but Karpathy provided a clear example during a talk at CVPR 2021 where the FSD (rightfully) slammed the break as a driver was driving his car literally into a lake.
- AareyBaba 4y ago
  The expectation is that FSD should not do stupid things that a normal alert human driver would not do like 1. drive straight into a concrete barrier https://youtu.be/Tr-oF7J0cBw?t=13 https://youtu.be/Tr-oF7J0cBw?t=13 2. drive straight under a tractor trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BgV-YnHZeE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BgV-YnHZeE In this instance 3. Come to a complete halt in a tunnel with busy high speed traffic for no apparent reason. And the excuse that the driver should have been ready to take over within fractions of a second of the Tesla making a mistake while in FSD is absurd expectations on human reflexes and attention.
danjc 4y ago
Good old single metric reporting. 273 FSD crashes in 1 year. Over how many miles driven? And how does that rate compare with non FSD vehicles?
- ncr100 4y ago
  It's non-deterministic, sure but it also is software so one should expect that Teslas with the same software and same hardware in the same situation will cause the same problem. Unless ... magic.
Ambergris 4y ago
Do your earbuds Bluetooth and wifi experience signal loss with the connection breaking? This occurs at sensitive locations of national security interests to prevent oh, let's say remote bomb detonation. At key infrastructure it ain't gonna happen. This means all data and responses are tied to Tesla Inc through nodes tracking tfo of everyone and is unsolvable for military installations, critical infrastructure are embedded throughout America for Liberty. Elon Musk is not and never will be American in the pursuit of Liberty. Autonomous is a lie. Autonomous means the vehicle itself needs all within it. This is RC autobot controlled vehicles with humans inside. I always have thought Musk a person of low moral/flawed character. But to do this type of wicked makes me despise him. He has never read a science fiction book in his life. If you love hacker news you Capiche . This an excellent article btw but most comments compare humans lacking situational awareness. This is a computer in a vehicle that requires ALL CAPABILITIES ON BOARD ACTIVE AT ALL TIMES. Ok, maybe as you drive along like 250 min then get a localized updat for all points 250 mile like a triptick from AAA, is a compromise. This is coding hell Heinlein warned us about.
nunez 4y ago
That's what that car gets for tailgating. The result would have been about the same if the car had to stop for real reasons.
- Krisjohn 4y ago
  The Tesla CHANGED LANES AND STOPPED. There was no tailgating. This is 100% the Tesla’s fault. Everyone else is a victim.

132 points by atchoo 4y ago

The Tesla should not have stopped but there is a cultural problem of driving way too close to the car in front of you. There are other justified scenarios why a car would have had to slam on the brakes at that same spot and the pileup would have still occurred.

platzhirsch 4y ago
This. After having moved from Germany to California I was astonished with how little safety gap folks leave between each other on the freeway. In Germany we are taught to keep a lot more gap because the time it takes to break or react will eat up a lot of distance. The last time I pointed this out I was told: well, I can still steer to the side if that happens.
- kccqzy 4y ago
  I did not see any emergency stopping lane on this stretch of the road. You would bump onto the narrow pedestrian walkway. So those people were wrong. We absolutely should keep more safety gap.
a_cardboard_box 4y ago
In this case the Tesla slammed on the brakes and changed lanes, so there wasn't a realistic way for the other car to prevent the collision.
- newaccount74 4y ago
  Curiously the vehicle behind the Tesla barely hit it whereas the drivers of the cars further back in the pileup seemed to have paid less attention. There would have been multiple ways for the cars further back to prevent a pileup: Drive slower, keep more distance. If you speed, have both hands on the wheel, look at the road, and be ready to brake quickly. It does sound like there were no severe injuries, so you could argue that people kept enough distance to avoid serious injuries.
  - godelski 4y ago
    There are lighting conditions that could play a role here since this was when people were entering the tunnel. This might also be something that freaked out the Tesla. But it is hard to know without being in the situation.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - creato 4y ago
    Even if all the vehicles following each had the same following distance and reaction time, each of them is going to encounter a vehicle stopping more quickly than the one in front of them did. So even if everyone performs similarly, the cars at the back are going to hit harder.
  - hanche 4y ago
    It’s really hard to tell, but to me it looks like the one behind that one managed to stop in time. But only with the tiniest margin. Action further back was much more dramatic, that’s for sure.
- markisus 4y ago
  You're right. The first rear-ending may have been unavoidable. However, you can see from the rear surveillance camera that subsequent vehicles could have stopped if everyone agreed to keep larger following distances. As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, there is the game-theoretical issue of other drivers cutting in when large gaps form so it would take some coordination on a technology / policy / cultural level to resolve the issue.
  - svnpenn 4y ago
    > drivers cutting in when large gaps form if they do, so what? even if 10 people cut in front of you, with a 30 minute drive, how much time are you really losing? 50 seconds?
  - Dudelander 4y ago
    That's just not true. The two cars behind that one were well more than two car lengths apart. Following too close is a non-sequitur.
    - jws 4y ago
      Unless they are going under 13mph, two car lengths is too close.
      - hallway_monitor 4y ago
        I have always heard you should keep two seconds between cars. So at 20mph, you are 60 feet apart. At 60mph you are 180 feet apart.
      - sidibe 4y ago
        In any case they stopped successfully, it was the ones behind them that pushed them forward.
  - roughly 4y ago
    The Tesla changed lanes and instantly became a stopped object. The car that hit it did the same, and so did every subsequent car. The follow distance to avoid a collision at that point is about 10 car lengths, or roughly the average stopping distance.
- econonut 4y ago
  The Tesla looks like it slowed down 200+ feet over 4 seconds. That's far from slamming on the brakes. It's also, however, very far from expected behavior which could explain why the drivers behind didn't slow down enough in time. They weren't expecting the Tesla to come to a complete stop. I'd guess if the other car was a Tesla it probably would have stopped in time to prevent the collision because it's basing its decisions on the environment not based on prior experience driving in that particular spot. I'd also argue that the Tesla pulling over into the left lane (merge 1 lane left vs 3 lanes to the right) is the right behavior in a situation that warrants stopping. Try to get to the side of the road so other cars can pass.
  - ruined 4y ago
    that is, in fact, slamming on the brakes. your estimate of 200+ft over 4 seconds, assuming perhaps a low highway speed of 60mph, is faster than many cars are capable of stopping, even assuming zero reaction time.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  It's ok, the car may have cut people off and caused an accident, but if you look at it on the basis of the the number of fatalities/mile, cutting off and causing a minor accident is no big deal. Clearly keeping Tesla's stock price up is a bigger deal.
- quantified 4y ago
  It's cars 3,4,5 or 4,5,6 that really hit hard. Coming to a full stop in the left lane is really last-resort stuff. That is the speed/passing lane (in most jurisdictions, all lands are speed/passing around the Bay Area and especially on the bridges).
cjbgkagh 4y ago
It's one of those things where if you don't close the gap you'll get other cars constantly trying to jump into it. Same with not speeding, you'll get overtaken constantly. Tends to make things more dangerous for you. I'm not sure what the answer is. It'll be hard to generate a consensus without some major policing.
- peter422 4y ago
  If you are driving in the "slow" lanes this is not the case. I generally cruise in the right or second to right lane with a large gap in front of me and it is certainly not more dangerous. Certainly faster traffic is passing on my left but not in a way that impacts me.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- godelski 4y ago
  I'm surprised this isn't higher up. I think a lot of people retcon their safe driving behaviors to what they learned in a driving test but not to what they do in practice. Or maybe a lot of people answering haven't driven in major cities? But yeah, drive in LA and see how long you can keep 3+ car lengths in front of you. I hate driving in LA.
- amf12 4y ago
  > It's one of those things where if you don't close the gap you'll get other cars constantly trying to jump into it. In general I am ok with people merging in the gap, but some people are assholes about it by merging too close to me that I have to brake. I don't understand why people merge when they know the person behind in the other lane will have to slow down to let them merge.
  - cjbgkagh 4y ago
    You have to keep slowing down to maintain the gap which causes more problems.
    - 4y ago
techdmn 4y ago
I haven't read statute, but my understanding has always been that if you run into the car in front of you, it is your fault, period. If you didn't have time to stop, you are "Following too close for conditions", regardless of what those conditions are. I agree that culturally a lot of people in such situations say "It's not my fault, they stopped right in front of me!", but as you correctly point out, there are legitimate reasons for someone to come to a sudden stop, and as a driver it is YOUR responsibility to make sure you are ready for that possibility.
- cjbgkagh 4y ago
  You get situations of people backing into you which looks like you ran into them. I think it's on the absence of other evidence the car with front damage is presumed guilty but if you have additional evidence like a dashcam you can challenge that presumption.
  - candiodari 4y ago
    You can easily tell this situation from the tire marks.
  - dylan604 4y ago
    In that situation, the person did not get hit from the rear. They hit someone with their rear.
    - cjbgkagh 4y ago
      Good luck proving that without evidence. You can see a number of youtube videos of people trying to perpetuate break checks as an insurance scam. Sometimes break checking alone doesn't work so they reverse into you. Relying too hard on simple heuristics creates these problems and additional evidence such as dash cams can help.
  - sorum 4y ago
    It's one of the reasons we have dashcams in both our cars. Added bonus is that if you witness an incident, the police is very happy when you can send them the video file to prove how it all happened.
bdcravens 4y ago
Humans drive in that world, and while these accidents still occur, typically are able to respond, as we have far better sensors and processing power.
pleb_nz 4y ago
I couldn't watch the video so can't comment directly on this case but it boggles the mind how close people follow others on the road. The distance you have between you and the car in front on you is one of the only safety zones you can control on the road. People should cherish it and let it blossom into wide open space. You often have no control over the left, right and rear. Why would you want to take away that front space as well?
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  aside, people drive somewhat close in the bay area, but also in my experience it's so much worse in both LA and in Austin, and in TX so many of them are 6000lb Ford F150s.
  - godelski 4y ago
    In LA if you try to have distance someone will fill in the spot. I've experienced this in the Bay too. While I agree with many of these comments about people driving too close, I think it ends up being too simple and naive to real world conditions. This behavior tends to be true in any major city but not so outside.
    - maerF0x0 4y ago
      Yeah I understand the "fill the spot" issue all too well. This is a behavior that our police/legal system is failing to address adequately. The emergent behavior is not the safe, legal, or even optimal behavior for traffic flow/reduction (afaik). But as I've observed in America, it's more about getting 1 car ahead of others than it is about having optimal outcomes across a large proportion of all traffic.
      - godelski 4y ago
        I have a hypothesis that this is another emergent pattern. I drive a lot between WA, OR, and CA. One thing I notice is that in OR I can easily pass people AND that if I'm in the left lane approaching someone there's a fairly high likelihood that they move right. Maybe 1 in 10 people don't move. But once I hit California I end up zig zagging much more, passing people who are in the left lane going below the speed limit (especially in central California). But I don't think the probability changed, but rather the population. Oregon is easier to rive in than Washington which is easier to drive in than California. I'm pretty sure this is just a small number of bad actors who are a constant percentage and their effects scale (probably also providing a feedback loop). I try to slightly combat this by calling the left most lane the "passing lane" rather than the "fast lane." A lot of people treat the left lane like kids treat lightup shoes: they think it makes them go faster. And don't get me started on elephant racing. I frequently wonder the economic and environmental impact of just this singular type of event in central California.
flibbityflob 4y ago
I think if the Tesla had been avoiding a hazard, there would be a lot more gray area for FSD to hide in. It’s true that sudden braking and swerving is sometimes the least-bad thing for a driver to do, but if a human driver showed a pattern of repeatedly performing that maneuver for no reason, at some point a reasonable person would have to conclude that that driver is at least partly at fault for the inevitable crash that happens.
ProAm 4y ago
Did the driver have his hand on the the controls at the time of the accident? FSD = Faulty Self Driving or Fairly Self Driving or Fully Stopped Driving.
Dudelander 4y ago
That was absolutely not the case in this accident. The Tesla swerved in front of the car in the next lane and then suddenly slammed on the breaks. The two cars behind that one were driving several car lengths back. There was no way for this accident to involve less than 4 cars.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  False. There exists a following distance and amount of paying attention that would have involved 0 cars hitting the tesla. If you look really closely at it at least 3 cars (maybe 4) stopped with next to no incident (it's not discernible if they even touched). It's the 5th or 6th car that shoves everyone into everyone else (and quite dramatically gets under the car infront of them and pops them up)
  - SrslyJosh 4y ago
    The Tesla changed lanes and came to a stop in the middle of a bridge for no reason. Would you make excuses for a human that did that while conscious and not in any kind of distress?
    - maerF0x0 4y ago
      > that while conscious and not in any kind of distress? I'd be less understanding, yes. But at this point it's presumable that the autopilot was in "distress" (avoiding a perceived issue). And when such a thing comes up, real or false, the drivers behind need to be ready to react. And several of the cars did so quite well actually. The only reason this is a dramatic incident is because of the like 5th or 6th car that hits everyone else hard.
  - timeon 4y ago
    Not sure how it is in SF. But I have noticed too many people on highway looking at their phones (even if it is illegal). On the other side I do not understand why this 'Autopilot' is not banned from the public roads.
maerF0x0 4y ago
Yes, exactly! tire blow out would have caused the exact same scenario (or worse). Would the headline be "Michelin causes 8 car crash just after rubber contract with Brazil" ? The title is completely unfair to Tesla.
- robofanatic 4y ago
  I guess its because Tesla is almost synonymous to "self driving car"
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- ncr100 4y ago
  That's not this situation. It's fair to assume "full self driving" will continue driving, rather than change lanes into an occupied lane, and stop abruptly. It should have slowed gradually. It's Tesla's fault.
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    The design flaw is Tesla's fault, yes. The chain reaction is not. And it's not fair to blame the design flaw for 8 cars. At most 1, but we see that 1 behind it actually more or less stopped.
cacozen 4y ago
This argument bears a lot of resemblance with victim-blaming phrases, like: “She shouldn’t have been raped, but did you see the dress she was wearing on a dark street?”
- amf12 4y ago
  Its not even remotely close. Women have a right to wear what they want without being raped for it. People don't have to drive dangerously too close and expect to not get in an accident.
  - ncr100 4y ago
    Not my understanding of this situation ..they pulled into another occupied lane and hit the brakes...so neither generalization is so simple a case to support.
    - abenga 4y ago
      This is true for the first car that hit the Tesla but not any of the others behind that.
dieselgate 4y ago
I agree with that but it seems like the Tesla basically cut off the driver to their left while changing lanes (while signaling) but also coming to a stop. Really weird behavior to see, of course, but this honestly doesn't seem like much of a "safe driving distance" thing to me.
vl 4y ago
The irony, of course, if other cars would have been software-driven they would just safely stop. I’ve been in the situation when Tesla auto breaking saved the car from crush, which was similar situation to this.
- ncr100 4y ago
  Lol. Ironic, truly, and likely the excuse made by Musk. He shipped a car which is Not designed for Today.
ncr100 4y ago
"But" nothing. This is a Technology Failure. Whomever worked on this software should face consequences. Hitting the brakes in the tunnel for no reason is a "never to this" kind of move. "But [...] other scenarios" is not the situation here. There is no escaped pet anaconda slithering across the tunnel floor. There's no Godzilla breathing fire inside the tunnel. It's just a car with no obstructions in front of it, none visible to any other drivers, and it's choosing to hit the brakes. There is no excuse. It's at the bottom of a downhill slope. There's a limited view of what's up ahead because the slope starts to incline inside that tunnel. Cars start to speed up. There is typically a massive amount of traffic on the bridge. Blame Tesla, full throatedly.
cycomanic 4y ago
> shows a Tesla Model S vehicle changing lanes and then abruptly braking in the far-left lane of the San Francisco Bay Bridge While it is true that there is a culture of following to closely, I don't think it applies here. When a car merges into your lane you should not abruptly change your speed to adjust the distance, but slowly increase it. Otherwise you get huge ripple effects and people 1km back will essentially be in stop and go mode.
- nrb 4y ago
  The video is literally evidence of the effects of following too closely. From the back angle, there are 4 vehicles starting with the white truck in the leftmost lane that pass through within 1.5 seconds; a few are only a few hundred milliseconds apart! If you switch back to the front view you see that’s exactly the cluster that piles up onto the safety braked vehicles ahead of them, because the white truck they’ve been tailgating has swerved into a moving lane and exposed the stopped traffic. Everyone beside perhaps the first car that had an incursion into its lane (but arguably failed to reduce speed to avoid an accident with a vehicle braking and signaling their lane) are WAY too close for the speed. Any speed reductions in those lanes would necessitate heavy braking which would cause exactly the ripple effects you’re referring to under normal conditions because there’s no buffer whatsoever to gradually reduce speed/increase distance either.
iJohnDoe 4y ago
It’s seems like everyone that has a Tesla - Drives way too close to other cars (tailgating). Drives way too fast all time, even in neighborhoods. Drives way too aggressive. Drives way too entitled. I’ve seen some crazy stuff from people driving a Tesla. Driving on the shoulder when traffic backs up. Zipping around people to steal parking spots.

darknavi 4y ago

A great example of how FSD/Autopilot is hugely flawed today. The car just does not give you clear indications of when or _why_ it is slowing down/swerving erratically in the lane when nothing is around. I get that about once a week. This is 100% the drivers fault though, it is extremely easy to override Autopilot. Tap the brakes will disable the entire system, press the accelerator will keep lane keeping on but override the speed, and moving the steering wheel will disable lane keeping but keep cruise control on.

andrewmunsell 4y ago
More often than not, I have my foot on the accelerator and not the brake when I am using AP. I don't drive a lot in general, but over the tens of thousands of miles on AP I had it hit the brakes hard enough to be a problem only once. It's definitely randomly slowed down many times, but with your foot on the accelerator it's very easy to override before it drops more than a couple MPH. Now, I've also heard people say that the phantom braking issue can be really violent and so it's very possible I've just never experienced true phantom braking, but based on how many of the drivers behind the initial wreck slammed into each other it's clear many folks do not pay enough attention or leave enough following distance to be safe.
- ncr100 4y ago
  Good data point. In this case it looks like the car not only breaks ... but it turned into an occupied lane. Then it stopped. It didn't stop gradually either. So I don't see how this is correct behavior on part of autopilot.
  - katbyte 4y ago
    or even turn on hazards. it just signalled and stopped.
methehack 4y ago
Given your description, I'm surprised you, or any responsible driver, would keep using the feature. It sounds really dangerous.

francisofascii 4y ago

Vehicles unfortunately have to come to a stop all the time on a highway for various reasons. This is clearly due the cars going too fast and too close from behind.

vngzs 4y ago
It is exceedingly abnormal to come to a complete stop in the far left lane.
amf12 4y ago
> This is clearly due the cars going too fast and too close from behind. This is due to both - buggy software being tested on public roads and people going too fast and driving close behind. The first two collisions couldn't have been avoided because of how abrupt Tesla changed the lane and stopped, thats on Tesla.

dzader 4y ago

Is this what happens when the driver ignores the steering wheel nag warning? I've never let mine get to that point but I think the car pulls over and stops? (Not saying what the Tesla did here was ok just curious if that's what it was doing)

abracadaniel 4y ago
In just autopilot, I don't think it actually pulls over. I tried it once, and it put on the hazard lights and began to coast to a stop. I was able to just turn off the hazards and use the pedal to resume driving as normal, so you can override at any time. It does penalize you by preventing you from turning AP back on during that drive.
- dzader 4y ago
  ah interesting. I guess the lack of hazards here might indicate this wasn't a case of the driver ignoring the warnings. They should have been ready to hit the gas regardless.
- boring_twenties 4y ago
  Venturing off-topic here but I can't imagine owning a vehicle that sees fit to "penalize" me as if it's my parent or credit card issuer rather than an inanimate object I own to use as I see fit.
  - skellera 4y ago
    If Tesla doesn’t, people would do dumb stuff and the government would end up playing parent. But that said, it’s fine. People who feel that way should not buy a Tesla or, if they do, don’t use AP. Free market and all that.
skellera 4y ago
Driver was obviously not paying attention. How does someone notice their car braking significantly and not just press the accelerator to counter it? AP will disengage the brake at that point. I think it’s made extremely clear that you need to be paying attention during FSD/AP. Car may have partial blame for doing something unexpected but driver didn’t do anything to get out of that situation.

xxpor 4y ago

>Teslas accounted for almost 70 percent of 329 crashes in which advanced driver assistance systems were involved, as well as a majority of fatalities and serious injuries associated with them, the data shows. This is pretty disingenuous given that I believe Teslas have probably covered by far the most miles with an "advanced driver assistance system". The Tesla definitely screwed up here, and I'm not sure you could have prevented the initial crash, but the pile up behind it is entirely the other drivers' fault.

pugworthy 4y ago
...I'm not sure you could have prevented the initial crash, but the pile up behind it is entirely the other drivers' fault. If other drivers should have seen and avoided the pileup, then it seems reasonable that the Tesla driver should have seen the unexpected braking and overridden it. In both cases, humans failed to react fast enough to something that required active focus and fast, split-second reaction.
- xxpor 4y ago
  Expecting the person in front of you to brake suddenly is (supposed to be) a normal part of driving.
flutas 4y ago
> This is pretty disingenuous given that I believe Teslas have probably covered by far the most miles with an "advanced driver assistance system". On top of that most other manufacturers don't have telemetry about it either and instead rely on dealerships to collect that information. > The Tesla definitely screwed up here, and I'm not sure you could have prevented the initial crash, but the pile up behind it is entirely the other drivers' fault. I'm still confused about the whole situation. Police report mentions FSD v11, which is only for employees so far. FSD v11 is what makes the freeway "FSD", otherwise it's their old "we go straight in lane, maybe take exit or change lane" code...which wouldn't be FSD. So either an employee crashed with internal only versions, or the police and owner are just incompetent about what they actually have.
kryptiskt 4y ago

bjornlouser 4y ago

In the second video the Tesla seems to stop short of the heavy shadow cast on the road. Guess it thought it was approaching a barrier of some sort...

andiareso 4y ago
You might be on to something there. I wonder if it was a vision-only version. Anecdotally, my wife and I used FSD out in Oregon while on vacation a year ago and had these these "phantom brakes" occur two times on the same stretch of road. It was very sunny day through the gorge to Hood River from Portland and I'm thinking there definitely would have been sharp contrasting shadows from the trees and sunlight.
m463 4y ago
can't help but think: optical can't do everything

danso 4y ago

Is it possible that this is the result of the driver ignoring the attention "nags"? Seems more plausible than FSD having a brain fart (unless many other FSD Teslas are making that same decision in that same spot). But even so, is Tesla's fail-mode really that unsophisticated? Pulling off into the left lane, even if it's the nearest off-lane, seems problematic, especially if it's in front of another vehicle who is at full speed b/c it had (until that moment) a clear road. I don't expect FSD to be able to find its way to a proper rest stop or off-ramp, but seems like a less dramatic shutdown mode should be possible, e.g. driving a couple of miles at moderate speed until there's a safer pull-off opportunity.

jws 4y ago
e.g. driving a couple of miles at moderate speed until there's a safer pull-off opportunity I'm fairly certain this isn't a legal option in the United States. That would be unattended self driving. It's probably a better solution, it just isn't available.
- danso 4y ago
  It is strange that if it is the case of driver-inattention-disengagement, that the Tesla wouldn't at least put on hazard lights. Maybe it wouldn't be enough in this situation, but in most cases, it would be a more obvious signal that the left lane change is an emergency maneuver.
  - jws 4y ago
    I haven’t looked at my tail lights, but in the US most cars have used the same bulb for hazard and brake. So the bulbs are already fully illuminated. Cars meant for the rest of the world have separate yellow lights in back and you could flash those. I think they are adding a rapid burst flash for alert with those.

beckingz 4y ago

Gotta appreciate the cars behind that just keep running into the mess.

Krisjohn 4y ago
It’s the visibility problem at the entrance to a tunnel. While you’re in the bright light, it’s harder to see into the shadow. I know that theoretically you should slow down, but practically nobody does, so it’s unsafe to suddenly break during a brief loss of visibility, as demonstrated.

maerF0x0 4y ago

> TESLA CRASH ON SF’S BAY BRIDGE > resulting in an eight-vehicle crash I'm sorry, but this is an 8 vehicle pile up from people following too close (or paying too little attention). At least where I'm from if you run into the back of a car it's your fault. It means you followed too close, failed to react to a situation in front of you. Should the car have stopped there, no? But is it that car's fault that others ran into the back of it? No.

advisedwang 4y ago
The Tesla changed lanes with very little clearance to the car behind it and then immediately braked. The first car that rear-ended the Tesla could not have avoided the accident short of mind-reading.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  And the car behind it braked with minimal impact (hard to tell, but you dont see the tesla jump in any major way like the subsequent cars do)... So it didn't completely cut off the car behind it. > short of mind-reading. This is called defensive driving and it involves running "what if scenarios" and being prepared for even those. "What if the tesla has a tire blow out and comes in my lane" Is something that can be thought of any brand of car.
urda 4y ago
It absolutely is the Tesla's fault for coming to an illegal stop in response to no event ahead of them during a lane change which is clearly demonstrated in video. The rest of your comment is approaching victim blaming. The Tesla is 100% at fault here.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  It's never illegal to stop in reaction to a perceived dangerous situation.
  - urda 4y ago

candyman 4y ago

Seems like a very strange move. The Tesla seems to signal a lane change and abruptly slow down at the same time on a highway with no lights, intersections, turns, or obstacles. This was precisely the type of driving I figured would be easy to automate - rather than deal with urban settings, pedestrians, bicycles, etc.

Someone1234 4y ago
Tesla's systems sometimes see phantom obstacles (e.g. shadows or reflections). Trying to change lanes away from them and then braking when they cannot isn't unusual at all. One of the reasons it is surprising regulators let this "beta" test be conducted on public roads with other drivers who weren't asked nor agreed to the disclaimers.
- roughly 4y ago
  > Tesla's systems sometimes see phantom obstacles (e.g. shadows or reflections) Shame they don’t have LiDAR or some other form of actual distance/range sensing.
  - m463 4y ago
    yet they have radar and 12 long-range sonar sensors
    - GaryNumanVevo 4y ago
      They actually removed the radar and ultrasonic sensors for model years 2021 and onward.
ModernMech 4y ago
The problem of driving a robot straight through a corridor while avoiding obstacles is Robotics 101 stuff. With the right sensors. This scenario calls for long rang distance detection, which is the natural wheelhouse of LIDAR. Unfortunately, Tesla seems to have something to prove when it comes to LIDAR, and stubbornly refuses to adopt the technology, despite crashes and even deaths that have occurred, and general industry understanding that it's the enabling technology for driverless cars. Is it legal to create a two-ton machine with admittedly beta-quality software, and a sensor stack that is known to be insufficient; and allow it to autonomous roam around town, crashing into things and killing their drivers? Apparently that is fine in the eyes of the law. Is it unethical? Society seems to be deliberating this one. I hear a lot of "the ends justify the means" style thinking in this area. Either way, this should embarrass the hell out of Tesla engineers. I used to feel sorry for them, but it's been long enough that they should know better.

taldo 4y ago

Comments mention driving too close to the car in front, or too fast, but I'd like to bring attention to distracted drivers. You can see how late the 4th-8th car apply the brakes, and quite reluctantly too. The first couple of cars behind the Tesla did crash but at a pretty low speed, I'd say not even at airbag-deploying speed. But the 6-7th end up hitting the pileup at a good 40-50mph.

zahma 4y ago
The paramount issue here is that the software isn't operating as intended. Reckless driving and distracted driving are compounding issues to that major concern. Rather than dismissing the accident as possible with a driver fully in control, distracted and reckless driving are great reasons why we shouldn't entrust auto-pilot software to public consumption yet.
- taldo 4y ago
  Agreed that FSD is crap and shouldn't be available to the public. Maybe it's okay to be tested out in the public by professional drivers, paid to do that, and monitored for attention/alertness, much like Waymo did for oh-so-long (and Uber didn't before the infamous 2018 accident). BUT... that Tesla could've been a student driver mistaking the brakes for the gas pedal, or a car running out of gas, or somebody passing out, or any number of other plausible circumstances where a car just stops in the left lane for no apparent reason.

zahma 4y ago

Enough is enough. Stop using the public as testing grounds for software development and marketing defunct wares. If tech is meant to bring us the utopia we all need but don't know we want, the least that these companies who exploit public space can do is to get some ethics before someone does die. As if it isn't enough that a multi-car pile up won't ruin some people's days and waste so much time dealing with insurance, why are we expected to put up with this in the name of "progress?" I also don't accept the argument that human are imperfect drivers, so it's OK if Tesla's shit software is placed at the hands of experienced drivers. People are not good at driving, and that's exactly why we don't need to enable our stupidity in a high-speed death box. Even if someone is a good driver, the tendency to relax when you are told that you don't need to be totally poised for action is a great way to delay response time, so I'd expect this to happen 99/100 with the best drivers in the world. In a situation with a relaxed driver, there's no humanly possible response time that's going to prevent this crash from happening. Tesla ought not proffer software that is anything less than perfect and expect the public to fill in the holes. It's clear that drivers today are less patient, more distracted, and less competent all while embattled with environmental distractions. And as if it isn't hard enough to monitor 360 degrees, now I need to focus on which kind of car is in my area? In some places, it's not even possible to avoid this kind of collision. I can only imagine what would happen on I-40 in Raleigh or I-95. That's truly frightening. I drive a Tesla and actually really enjoy the car, but I still get phantom braking issues, albeit the car does not fully brake and change lanes. Thank goodness I turned all of those features off. And that leads me to think that Tesla knows they have kinks to iron out. With all the data that they collect, they must have known accidents like this could happen and still put their product out. I want to see criminal charges, fines, and a Congressional investigation leading to legislation. What's the price of a life, Mr. Musk? Would you put your kids in one of your cars, turn on auto-pilot, and expect them to make it from Point A to Point B each and every time?

freedomben 4y ago
0 mistakes seems like a pretty extremist and impossible standard. If that standard had been applied to automobiles before they could be driven on roads, we'd still have horse and buggy everywhere and we'd be dealing with catastrophic amounts of horse shit on all the city streets

SrslyJosh 4y ago

Man, I had no idea there were so many HNers with strong opinions on highway follow distance. rolls eyes

whiplash451 4y ago

NATFB (not a tesla fan boy) but isn’t there an inherent bias towards reporting and exploiting FSD’s faulty behaviors vs reporting the times where it saved butts?

danso 4y ago
Elevators undoubtedly save lives over time, but it's a lot harder to count how many heart attacks didn't happen vs. how many people were suddenly crushed to death. But if an elevator ran perfectly for years at a time but also could, at any moment, instantly and inexplicably kill its occupants — it's still every important to understand why there's a flaw in the automation. In any case, how would you measure when FSD/AP "saved butts"? Every driver is expected to operate the systems with the same ability and awareness to manually intervene (i.e. save themselves) as if the automation wasn't in place.
- whiplash451 4y ago
  > In any case, how would you measure when FSD/AP "saved butts"? I would not know how to measure it, but Karpathy provided a clear example during a talk at CVPR 2021 where the FSD (rightfully) slammed the break as a driver was driving his car literally into a lake.
AareyBaba 4y ago
The expectation is that FSD should not do stupid things that a normal alert human driver would not do like 1. drive straight into a concrete barrier https://youtu.be/Tr-oF7J0cBw?t=13 https://youtu.be/Tr-oF7J0cBw?t=13 2. drive straight under a tractor trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BgV-YnHZeE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BgV-YnHZeE In this instance 3. Come to a complete halt in a tunnel with busy high speed traffic for no apparent reason. And the excuse that the driver should have been ready to take over within fractions of a second of the Tesla making a mistake while in FSD is absurd expectations on human reflexes and attention.

danjc 4y ago

Good old single metric reporting. 273 FSD crashes in 1 year. Over how many miles driven? And how does that rate compare with non FSD vehicles?

ncr100 4y ago
It's non-deterministic, sure but it also is software so one should expect that Teslas with the same software and same hardware in the same situation will cause the same problem. Unless ... magic.

Ambergris 4y ago

Do your earbuds Bluetooth and wifi experience signal loss with the connection breaking? This occurs at sensitive locations of national security interests to prevent oh, let's say remote bomb detonation. At key infrastructure it ain't gonna happen. This means all data and responses are tied to Tesla Inc through nodes tracking tfo of everyone and is unsolvable for military installations, critical infrastructure are embedded throughout America for Liberty. Elon Musk is not and never will be American in the pursuit of Liberty. Autonomous is a lie. Autonomous means the vehicle itself needs all within it. This is RC autobot controlled vehicles with humans inside. I always have thought Musk a person of low moral/flawed character. But to do this type of wicked makes me despise him. He has never read a science fiction book in his life. If you love hacker news you Capiche . This an excellent article btw but most comments compare humans lacking situational awareness. This is a computer in a vehicle that requires ALL CAPABILITIES ON BOARD ACTIVE AT ALL TIMES. Ok, maybe as you drive along like 250 min then get a localized updat for all points 250 mile like a triptick from AAA, is a compromise. This is coding hell Heinlein warned us about.

nunez 4y ago

That's what that car gets for tailgating. The result would have been about the same if the car had to stop for real reasons.

Krisjohn 4y ago
The Tesla CHANGED LANES AND STOPPED. There was no tailgating. This is 100% the Tesla’s fault. Everyone else is a victim.