[UPDATED] 2 die in Tesla crash - NHTSA reports driver seat occupied

[MikeyC]

I know it's human nature to try to figure things out and contemplate scenarios but if someone asked me what I think is most likely, I'm going with the simplest explanation until I hear official results of a proper investigation. Someone said it earlier. What do you do when showing off your Tesla? You: (1) Demonstrate acceleration and (2) Demonstrate autopilot. To me, the most likely scenario is (1) going wrong and ending up in a tree. Without any additional evidence, movie plots like a 10 second sprint to turn on AP and the driver diving to the back seat, or two wives plotting to kill their husbands are just that: movie plots.

Mike

 

[gearchruncher]

Elon Musk owns his data that he has worked so hard to spend money and resources to collect and disclose as he sees fit!

Tesla worked hard to make a car.
Apple worked hard to make a cell phone.
Google worked hard to make their search engine and Gmail.
Your doctor worked hard in medical school.

Does that give them the right to disclose your address, social security number, date of birth, and the fact that you searched "can you get an STD from a goat" and then spent 67 minutes at the local VD clinic on March 23rd?

 

[Effopec]

There were reports from I believe the BiL that they were going to try out autopilot and the Constable seemed to use this info as proof that nobody was driving. That statement doesn't mean that they were doing it immediately upon leaving the driveway. Most people would get to a reasonably "main" road to demo AP. So my guess is still that he hit the accelerator hard to show off the acceleration and missed the curve. Perhaps he had a few drinks with dinner? I'm sure the authorities know this by now but will wait for all the info before publishing their report. The issue is that press is still calling this an autopilot failure when they very well could have the info now to disprove this.

 

[SMAlset]

Tesla worked hard to make a car.
Apple worked hard to make a cell phone.
Google worked hard to make their search engine and Gmail.
Your doctor worked hard in medical school.

Does that give them the right to disclose your address, social security number, date of birth, and the fact that you searched "can you get an STD from a goat" and then spent 67 minutes at the local VD clinic on March 23rd?

Huh? The only thing Tesla/Elon had released initially that I recall in past accidents publicly has been weather AP or FSD was in use at time of crash. It’s been what everyone seems immediately focused on (and IMO wanting to blame for the accident). I believe in the 101 barrier accident before the NTSB released its report it was later revealed that the drivers wheel had not recorded touch for a period of time and when AP had been turned off the driver would have had something like 5 or 6 seconds of view of the roadway before impact to take evasive action. Never heard of Tesla giving out personal info other than as required by law to investigating authorities.

Anything beyond that has been what officials have revealed like confirming identity (after appropriate family notified) and the press has picked up other details from news coverage (like where it happened) and from interviewing people at the scene and elsewhere. The NTSB report when released provides quite a bit of driver background including any basic medical related info that could have pertained to the accident, like vision issues or driving under the influence. How experienced the driver was, recall in the case of a trucker what their schedule had been in days prior (like was sleep deprivation a factor). The scene is thoroughly examined including roadway signals and markings, time of day, weather and lighting influences, and very detailed vehicle data logs leading up to the impact. Now the report is made public sometimes at a public conference but these are rather rare occasions that the NTSB is called in for. Otherwise the police report would be the standard investigative report and only parts of it made public.

In the case of fatalities certain death information will become public.

 

[alexgr]

Tesla worked hard to make a car.
Apple worked hard to make a cell phone.
Google worked hard to make their search engine and Gmail.
Your doctor worked hard in medical school.

Does that give them the right to disclose your address, social security number, date of birth, and the fact that you searched "can you get an STD from a goat" and then spent 67 minutes at the local VD clinic on March 23rd?

Of course yes! It is their responsibility to the well-being of the goat.

 

[qdeathstar]

Tesla worked hard to make a car.
Apple worked hard to make a cell phone.
Google worked hard to make their search engine and Gmail.
Your doctor worked hard in medical school.

Does that give them the right to disclose your address, social security number, date of birth, and the fact that you searched "can you get an STD from a goat" and then spent 67 minutes at the local VD clinic on March 23rd?

Uniquely dumb post, but I’ll play along. Please present an example of Tesla doing anything remotely close to your scenario?

 

[gearchruncher]

Uniquely dumb post, but I’ll play along. Please present an example of Tesla doing anything remotely close to your scenario?

They haven't. But the OP indicated that the data was Tesla's and they could disclose it. I was pointing out that just because a company "worked hard" doesn't mean that they have the right to disclose information they are in possession of.

 

[MikeyC]

Uniquely dumb post, but I’ll play along. Please present an example of Tesla doing anything remotely close to your scenario?

Careful what you wish for. CR may post a video on their test track of a Tesla rear ending a paper mache goat!

Mike

 

[2101Guy]

Admittedly I have not read the entire thread, but generally speaking, I am getting a root cause of: whomever was responsible for driving the car, willfully and intentionally bypassed safety measures, acted irresponsibly, and as a result, that person is legally at fault. There has been not evidence of any form of legal liability for Tesla for this accident.

Is that fairly accurate?

 

[MorrisonHiker]

Admittedly I have not read the entire thread, but generally speaking, I am getting a root cause of: whomever was responsible for driving the car, willfully and intentionally bypassed safety measures, acted irresponsibly, and as a result, that person is legally at fault. There has been not evidence of any form of legal liability for Tesla for this accident.

Is that fairly accurate?

It's possible the driver didn't "intentionally bypass safety measures" but just failed to control the car when driving at a high rate of speed.

 

[SomeJoe7777]

Admittedly I have not read the entire thread, but generally speaking, I am getting a root cause of: whomever was responsible for driving the car, willfully and intentionally bypassed safety measures, acted irresponsibly, and as a result, that person is legally at fault. There has been not evidence of any form of legal liability for Tesla for this accident.

Is that fairly accurate?

The crux of most of the discussion is: Was Autopilot / EAP / FSD / TACC (i.e. any of the automation systems) involved in this accident? And if so, how could that have occurred? And if not, why was there no body in the driver's seat after the fire was extinguished?

The general consensus is that while it is technically possible for two people to get the car moving by abusing one or more of the automation systems without anyone occupying the driver's seat, the circumstances required to do so are highly unlikely and do not correspond with other evidence available (very short travel distance by the car, limited acceleration available while in an automation mode, etc.) A more likely scenario is that the automation systems were not involved, and one of the occupants moved out of the driver's seat after the crash.

 

[EVNow]

The lack of using the seat sensor at all means Tesla isn't even bothering to use what's already there. There might be a logical explanation. I'd have to see how other L2 systems are implemented that use a torque sensor.

Not really. They already use seat belt sensor. Any sensible person would say, if the seatbelt is on, someone is sitting in the seat.

Its not a question of "bothering to use what's already there". Its a question of thinking what scenarios are likely - and addressing those. You can't address every edge case (duh - this is not FSD !).

Vast majority of cars on the road have cruise control - what safety measures do they include ?

 

[qdeathstar]

They haven't. But the OP indicated that the data was Tesla's and they could disclose it. I was pointing out that just because a company "worked hard" doesn't mean that they have the right to disclose information they are in possession of.

Ah ok, so you were just being disingenuous with your example.

 

[EVNow]

I just don’t see the passenger in the drivers’s seat crawling over the console after the accident.

Its far easier to go from driver seat to passengers - I guess we have all done it (very tight parking and its easier to get out of the passenger side, for eg). The driver would definitely try that if driver side door is jammed.

 

[EVNow]

Elon Musk owns his data that he has worked so hard to spend money and resources to collect and disclose as he sees fit!

Thats absolute BS. Its also illegal in multiple countries.

Musk ("Tesla") owns the IP they have created. Not my driving records. Just as Google owns IP on search engines - not what I searched on their platform (the latter depends on various things like regulations, company policy, usage contracts etc).

“any data in an event data recorder required to be installed in a passenger motor vehicle (as provided for under Department of Transportation [DOT] regulations concerning the collection, storage, and retrievability of on-board motor vehicle crash event data) is the property of the owner or lessee of the vehicle in which the recorder is installed, regardless of when the vehicle was manufactured.”

 

[qdeathstar]

You can opt in to share data with Tesla. Tesla probably has language that allows them to collect and release some days without your permission

 

[EVNow]

No. However, there are a number of Youtubers who show that their Autopilot can continue to function without any driver in the driver's seat.

Since Tesla has already programmed that Autopilot will not work with the seatbelt unbuckled, it just needs to add one more factor about the weight and not just the seatbelt status only.

Then, youtubers will add some weight to the seat.

You add driver monitoring using they camera, they will place a dummy on the seat that can cheat the monitoring camera.

You can't make changes with the intention of stopping hackers (this is not like a PC you are trying to protect from internet hackers). You only add features to help legitimate users, use it safely.

 

[MP3Mike]

“any data in an event data recorder required to be installed in a passenger motor vehicle (as provided for under Department of Transportation [DOT] regulations concerning the collection, storage, and retrievability of on-board motor vehicle crash event data) is the property of the owner or lessee of the vehicle in which the recorder is installed, regardless of when the vehicle was manufactured.”

What about all the data that isn't in the "event data recorder"? (Most of the data is not in the EDR, it contains very limited data.)

 

[EVNow]

Tesla probably has language that allows them to collect and release some days without your permission

The language has to be consistent with regulations - otherwise the law wins.

I suspect they can't release any individually identifiable information except when legally requested by authorities.

What about all the data that isn't in the "event data recorder"? (Most of the data is not in the EDR, it contains very limited data.)

They will still have to comply with any other policies / contracts they have with us (remember all the pages we signed without reading ?) - as well as regulations like GDPR.

I have zero clue as to how Tesla works - but in most tech companies - internally one would establish policies that would comply with the strictest regulation on privacy (usually GDPR). In my current (unnamed) company and my previous company (Microsoft) we spent enormous amount of resources / energy making sure the privacy regulations and policies are complied with.

 

[ev_go123]

Dave Lee talking about consumer report's "demonstration" of autopilot without a driver:

tldw: Tesla and other companies should a responsibility to prevent accidental injury/death using their products, but shouldn't be held responsible for deliberate misuse of their systems (e.i. buckling seat belt behind, climbing through a car to avoid opening a door, weights on the stearing wheel, etc).

We give a certain level of trust/responsibility to drivers when they drive cars, if drivers want to abuse that trust/responsibility, they can easily kill themselves and others. Regardless of car types or if it has AP or not.