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Tesla Confirms Automated Driving Systems Were Engaged During Fatal Crash
- tiahura 3y ago17th fatal Tesla crash while the systems were engaged since June 2021 So about 8.5 / year. Given the number of Teslas on the road, and the total number of road fatalities, that doesn’t seem like all that many.
- dgrin91 3y agoThis is probably a large underestimate given that Tesla tends to be very aggressive on not sharing all their data and not calling things autopilot related when they probably should be. Than being said, even if we 10x this I would guess that number is still pretty low. The comparison should not be relative to 0, the comparison should be relative to number of equivalent human driving hours. How many teslas on the road are out there, how many hours/miles have they driven, and how does that stack up to average human driving in comparison? Obviously those stats can be gamed, but I'm generally inclined to say that as long as there isn't some crazy increase then its a step in the right direction.
- bmcahren 3y ago> We also receive a crash alert anytime a crash is reported to us from the fleet, which may include data about whether Autopilot was active at the time of impact. > To ensure our statistics are conservative, we count any crash in which Autopilot was deactivated within 5 seconds before impact, and we count all crashes in which the incident alert indicated an airbag or other active restraint deployed. (Our crash statistics are not based on sample data sets or estimates.) > In practice, this correlates to nearly any crash at about 12 mph (20 kph) or above, depending on the crash forces generated. We do not differentiate based on the type of crash or fault (For example, more than 35% of all Autopilot crashes occur when the Tesla vehicle is rear-ended by another vehicle). In this way, we are confident that the statistics we share unquestionably show the benefits of Autopilot. Every answer to your questions is on the link below: Source: https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport
- BoorishBears 3y agoThe Tesla safety report has never been a good-faith attempt at communicating their stats. They compare Teslas to every single other vehicle on the road. The average Tesla owner is already in a demographic that would have dramatically lower accident rates than the average. The average age of a Tesla vehicle also dramatically lowers it. Then you add in the fact AP is skewed towards highway use and disengages in tricky situations... Before you even factor in AP you're already starting with the picture Tesla wants to paint.
- taylodl 3y ago> the comparison should be relative to number of equivalent human driving hours Not necessarily, this would be true if autopilot made the same kinds of mistakes that humans do - these are the kinds of mistakes that other humans, e.g. other drivers, motorcyclists, bicyclists, pedestrians, are on the lookout for. That is to say we're very experienced with the kinds of mistakes humans make and the conditions in which they make them, and so we can defend ourselves against them. If autopilot is making all-new mistakes under totally different conditions then it removes that ability to defend ones self and lead to even more issues. We humans have a keen sense for how other humans will react in a given situation.
- dgrin91 3y agoDo we have the ability to defend ourselves? How do you defend against a drunk driver? Lots of people die to random car crashes because they aren't able to defend themselves. The promising thing I've always thought about self driving is that while it may make stupid, unpredictable mistakes (drive into flashing firetruck at 60mph) it does this less than a typically human driver would make typical human casualty inflicting mistakes. Moreover we can build & improve to eliminate firetruck ramming; we unfortunately have not been able to eliminate drunk driving.
- taylodl 3y agoWe've been unwilling to eliminate drunk driving. Breathalyzer ignition lock? Problem solved. Self-driving cars are an extremely poor solution (complexity and cost) to solve this simple problem. People have fought tooth and nail to enable drunk driving - and they've won. Just like they're fighting and winning for mass shootings. Even so, drunk drivers are largely predictable. People know when it's not a good time to be on the streets.
- nickthegreek 3y agoWe don't know how many Tesla's on the road have purchased the optional FSD package. You would need to use that number, not the number of Teslas on the road.
- tahoeskibum 3y agoThis was an old 2014 model which had old HW1 Mobileye based package. It cannot have FSD.
- jimnotgym 3y agoI don't know if that is a lot or not. 17th whilst self driving engaged sounds like a lot more common, not all Tesla's have self driving, not every trip has it engaged.
- Gordonjcp 3y agoAlso given that Tesla can only use "Autopilot" in conditions where human drivers generally don't crash, either.
- tensor 3y agoHumans generally don't crash on the highway? You must live on a different planet. Every single day humans are doing absolutely batshit insane maneuvers on the highway. I can't recall a single time it's been a Tesla on autopilot that has done something that scared the shit out of me. It's really astonishing we let humans drive at all.
- Gordonjcp 3y agoAnd yet most of the accidents you see don't happen on motorways. All the cars are travelling in the same direction at the same speed, it's practically impossible to crash. A huge part of the problem is that Americans can't drive. They have no training and absolutely atrocious practical driving skills.
- pengaru 3y agoThere's no shortage of Tesla owners in topical HN threads saying they never/rarely use Autopilot for any number of reasons, ranging from it's bat-shit crazy to phantom-braking still being a frequent occurrence. So you really need the number of Teslas being operated by autonomous functionality, not the gross number of Teslas on the road, to make any kind of judgement here. And even within that set, if you had the data, it needs to be normalized for operating in ideal conditions vs. regular cars in ideal conditions. The autonomous problems have seen enough coverage that everyone is aware at this point. Even Joe Rogan has talked about not really using those features of his Tesla multiple times on his very popular JRE podcast. What proportion of Tesla owners have the cars just because they're the fastest and most social-statusy EVs on the market, despite the autonomous b.s. and just ignore those features?
- tahoeskibum 3y agoThis was an old 2014 model with basically advanced traffic aware cruise control. I wonder how many Toyotas get into accidents with regular cruise control. The figure of merit is number of accidents per mile...
- stefan_ 3y agoTesla Unveils Dual Motor And Autopilot, Oct 10, 2014: https://youtu.be/FZ6lZJWL_Xk?t=378 https://youtu.be/FZ6lZJWL_Xk?t=378 "from zero miles an hour to 155 miles an hour and so it'll detect if there's a car in your blind spot if you've got a highway barrier on one side if there's something you might you know move into in any way possible" Toyota never claimed any of this stuff.
- TacticalCoder 3y ago> Toyota never claimed any of this stuff. My wife's (ex-) 2019 Toyota CH-R had warnings for vehicles in blind spots while driving (or parking) and gave a nice feedback in the steering wheel if, when above 50 km/h, you'd steer out of your lane without using your blinker. It was very convenient and a nice security feature without claiming to be an auto-pilot.
- Eavolution 3y agoNot my car but a member of my family's car does that with the steering wheel and I hate driving it. Granted I live in the country, but I want to be able to go over the line slightly to avoid something in the road without it trying to shove me back
- lostmsu 3y agoI turn on blinker when I do it to indicate to others that I am about to.
- speedgoose 3y agoThey do sell those features. Here is an announcement about a partnership between Toyota and Mobileye: https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/mobileye-zf-team-advanced-safety-systems-toyota-2021-05-18/ https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/mobile...
- hammock 3y agoCrazy that Tesla is allowed to reveal this kind of info. Seems like a privacy violation
- jeffbee 3y agoYou believe that someone should be able to drive a car, cause bodily harm to others, and relevant information about those events would be private, not discoverable by interested parties? If so, why?
- hammock 3y agoIf a court orders discovery, sure. But for Tesla to preemptively reveal private, provocative data from the product you supposedly bought outright? No
- jeffbee 3y agoState law controls access to crash data records and the NTSB is broadly entitled to access them. You may also wish to research the concept of "implied consent". Your ability to drive on public roads comes with compromises to absolute privacy rights.
- Animats 3y agoTesla-supported accounts, please give your excuse by number: 1. It's not the current production model. 2. The driver should have been paying attention. 3. We're not sure self-driving was on. 4. It's a beta version. 5. The correct measurement of hazard is some other metric that makes Tesla look better. 5. "No new technology has been fully accepted by society until it has killed someone".
- oh_sigh 3y ago2. How exactly does one miss a 40' long, 10' tall truck that is emblazoned with flashing lights?
- modernpacifist 3y agoBy not reading past the word "Autopilot" in the product description and ticking the Accept Terms box instead of having their personal lawyer review it, like the rest of us do.
- SketchySeaBeast 3y ago> instead of having their personal lawyer review it, like the rest of us do. Wait, do you all have personal lawyers that you pay to review every (or any) EULA you accept? I clearly do not make enough money to hang out on this site.
- qwytw 3y agoWell I generally find it much harder to remain attentive when using an autopilot. I assume I'm not unique in the regard (i.e. it's an "autopilot" but technically you must pay as much attention to what happening if you were driving yourself. What would be the point of such feature? Well.. obviously companies obviously bring this up when something bad happens and not in their marketing material).
- oh_sigh 3y agoThe problem is the car doesn't let you ignore it. You need to perform some kind of "hey, are you paying attention?" input on the steering wheel what seems like every 30 seconds or so(not sure of the exact numbers). Maybe the driver just happened to doze off in that intervening 30 seconds...at which point, he would have crashed anyway.
- oblib 3y agoThe problem with this is people trust it. This stuff will be sketchy until there is car to car and road to car communication. Getting that infrastructure in place to the last mile will never happen. That said there are aspects of that tech now that could be utilized to improve safety in all new cars and it doesn't have to be configured to "drive" a car, but instead assist the driver.
- snapcaster 3y agoYeah i can't believe people trusted something called "Full self driving" and "autopilot". I mean come on, at what point should marketers be held accountable for how the things they say will be reasonably interpreted
- penjelly 3y agoits still fully self driving, even if its driving into a wall /s
- deepzn 3y ago> (From a comment) Tesla Hardware v3 (2019) is needed to run FSDb, though Hardware v2.5 (2017) can run a limited feature set. The 2014 Model S involved in this crash can’t use FSDb and actually uses the Mobileye EyeQ3 system (Hardware v1) before Tesla designed their own.
- JoshGlazebrook 3y agoThis. There isn't really anything _Tesla_ specific about this situation. It just happened to be a Tesla vehicle, but the actual "automated driving system" involved is made by a completely different company, and is present in many other vehicles - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobileye#Comparison https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobileye#Comparison
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> isn't really anything _Tesla_ specific about this situation My Subaru has lane-keeping tech. It's an absolute nag about my keeping my hands on the wheel and eyes on the road. I've driven a Tesla, and it's more lackadaisical.
- speedgoose 3y agoIt nags a lot on model 3/y in Europe unless it’s very slow stop and go traffic. Similarly than other brands. It will even put you in "jail" mode if you don’t react quickly to the nag too many times during a drive (didn’t happen to me as I’m obviously the most perfect driver).
- throwaway2016a 3y agoIn my experience Tesla is pretty strict, especially now with the driver camera able to tell if you are watching the road. With the new driver cam it cares less about you applying pressure to the wheel but it's still pretty nagging. My Volvo on the other hand (which has Lane Keep Assist with Adaptive Cruise Control) will gladly just slowly drift into the other lane sometimes (not always) if I don't correct it. Edit: who the heck downvotes someone sharing their personal experiences? It's not like I'm fan boy-ing out. Sigh.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- cracrecry 3y agoWhen I was young I got a tech job in Spain that was great but required me working until night, so I will go home by car at 1AM-3AM. I had three incidents of crazy vehicles that nearly killed me. The last one with more than 50% of probability of dying. I am alive by sheer luck. I was so upset that went to the Police to denounce it. They told me that it was routine, that the guys going out the discos at that particular spot were so full of drugs and alcohol that there will be accidents all weekends. There were raids and people detained but they continued doing it. I left the work and told my boss to look for someone that did not need to use the car there. I can't wait for the day people could kill themselves if they want with drugs, but let their cars drive for them and do not kill others.
- korse 3y agoWhy does anyone care if it isn't killing bystanders? Self driving is the same as other vehicle performance enhancing features in one major respect. More risk, more reward. If you purchase and use the feature, you should be aware that vision systems have limitations and operate accordingly. IMHO, they should remove the guardrails and tune the system to prioritize bystander safety. Otherwise, I'm going to stick to my motorcycles.
- gomijacogeo 3y agoIs this one of the models that had its radar removed or disabled? I'm not saying working radar would have prevented this accident, but working radar would have prevented this accident.