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

[gearchruncher]

it's even called a "beta feature" just like the rest of them.

Teslas have had TACC since October 2014. Over 6.5 years ago. Meanwhile, the $20K GM rental I drove last week had auto braking and active cruise control that were not in beta. I had a 2004 BMW that had auto wipers that weren't in beta. I wonder what what takes Tesla so long to get these features officially released compared to other companies. (/s)

More seriously, the discussion about TACC being part of "AP" is blurred because Tesla includes TACC as part of paying for AP (remember, 2014-2019, basic AP was an option). So they have to discuss it as part of "AP" so people don't wonder why their car won't do it. If you really think of having TACC engaged as "using autopilot" than a huge number of vehicles on the road today have autopilot. Technically, it is an L2 ADAS per the SAE just like Tesla's whole AP suite though.

 

[electricar]

Other OEMs don’t call features that sort of work ( I’m looking at you BMW ) beta because they have marketing and PR departments.

 

[gearchruncher]

Other OEMs don’t call features that sort of work ( I’m looking at you BMW ) beta because they have marketing and PR departments.

Are you saying that auto wipers and traffic aware cruise control only sort of works on a Tesla?
I've never had issues with either of these on a BMW in the last decade. Nor a Tesla actually, which is why it's silly they have them in "Beta" and use the same terminology as city streets. They are really devaluing the "beta" name to have so much in that bucket. If you have a Tesla, have used TACC for years with no issues, and get told "that's beta, and so is this brand new feature" you may reasonably have people thinking that the new feature is as stable as other beta things.
Using "beta" to get out of any responsibility is kind of endemic in Tech. Google is notorious for it.

 

[cucubits]

Are you saying that auto wipers and traffic aware cruise control only sort of works on a Tesla?

Yes. Auto wipers on a Tesla are worse than those on every other car out there. They either go too fast or not fast enough.
Traffic aware cruise control on a tesla can be "out of beta" once they sort out all phantom breaking. Until then, these only sort of work.

 

[Soda Popinski]

Yes. Auto wipers on a Tesla are worse than those on every other car out there. They either go too fast or not fast enough.
Traffic aware cruise control on a tesla can be "out of beta" once they sort out all phantom breaking. Until then, these only sort of work.

The problem is fast you want the wipers going is subjective. I'm guessing it's what may be optimal for the Autopilot cameras to see. Sort of a problem for us manual-pilots.

 

[Silicon Desert]

The problem is fast you want the wipers going is subjective. I'm guessing it's what may be optimal for the Autopilot cameras to see. Sort of a problem for us manual-pilots.

good guess. An out of the box thinker.
And on that note, my auto-wipers haven't activated for 6 months. Oh wait, it hasn't rained for 6 months.

 

[gearchruncher]

I'm guessing it's what may be optimal for the Autopilot cameras to see.

If this was true, wouldn't it only need to go fast when AP was engaged? Other companies have AEB, lane keeping, auto high beams, and other vision based stuff and don't need hyperactive wipers. Do the wipers in AP1 cars behave this way when they used a more traditional sensor?

I think it's more tied to *how* they sense rain using the AP cameras. It probably doesn't have a lot of dynamic range in sensing the amount of rain, so it just goes whenever the image has any obscuration at all.

 

[Electroman]

Teslas have had TACC since October 2014. Over 6.5 years ago. Meanwhile, the $20K GM rental I drove last week had auto braking and active cruise control that were not in beta. I had a 2004 BMW that had auto wipers that weren't in beta. I wonder what what takes Tesla so long to get these features officially released compared to other companies. (/s)

More seriously, the discussion about TACC being part of "AP" is blurred because Tesla includes TACC as part of paying for AP (remember, 2014-2019, basic AP was an option). So they have to discuss it as part of "AP" so people don't wonder why their car won't do it. If you really think of having TACC engaged as "using autopilot" than a huge number of vehicles on the road today have autopilot. Technically, it is an L2 ADAS per the SAE just like Tesla's whole AP suite though.

Finally gear says something in this topic that is not trollish..

 

[rxlawdude]

If this was true, wouldn't it only need to go fast when AP was engaged? Other companies have AEB, lane keeping, auto high beams, and other vision based stuff and don't need hyperactive wipers. Do the wipers in AP1 cars behave this way when they used a more traditional sensor?

I think it's more tied to *how* they sense rain using the AP cameras. It probably doesn't have a lot of dynamic range in sensing the amount of rain, so it just goes whenever the image has any obscuration at all.

Argument clinic. John Cleese. Automatic gainsaying.

It fits.

 

[alexgr]

Just saw this... no mentioning of car brand. No senate hearing.

Car explosion along Texas highway caught on video

WATCH: The video shows the moments of explosion closeup as the car drives by on the opposite side of the road.

abc7.com

 

[cucubits]

Just saw this... no mentioning of car brand. No senate hearing.

Car explosion along Texas highway caught on video

WATCH: The video shows the moments of explosion closeup as the car drives by on the opposite side of the road.

abc7.com

I was actually nearby, saw the huge black puff of smoke from a few blocks away. Firetrucks were there in under 5 mins but yeah, nothing on the news, no wild headlines, nothing.

 

[Yuri_G]

U.S. safety board to release report on Texas Tesla crash within a month

The U.S. transport safety board is working to publish as soon as possible a preliminary report on a recent Tesla (TSLA.O) vehicle crash in Texas in which local police said no one was in the driver's seat, a senior official told Reuters, acknowledging public confusion over the fatal accident.

www.reuters.com

 

[alexgr]

I was actually nearby, saw the huge black puff of smoke from a few blocks away. Firetrucks were there in under 5 mins but yeah, nothing on the news, no wild headlines, nothing.

Just imagine it was a Tesla!

 

[qdeathstar]

This is just ridiculous.

One of Autopilot's features was active in fatal Tesla crash

Tesla said Monday that one of Autopilot's features was active during the April 17 crash that killed two men in Spring, Texas.

www.cnn.com

just to be clear, adaptive crude control was not on, correct?

Also, in the article they complain that Tesla doesn’t engage with the media. It wouldn’t shock me If these new sites purposefully misquote things to get a reaction of engagement from Tesla

 

[Southpasfan]

You know, I understand safety concerns with respect to products. But the amount of FUD aimed at this company is just incredible.

I have had a Model 3 for two years with FSD so I have seen all the iterations since then. Before I had it, I would have figured that if a major news organization had an article that, at a minimum, someone would actually drive a Tesla to see how it works.

With any form of machine control, the public would be worried about (1) a failure of the machine, and (2), since we have all seen the Terminator movies, the "machine" whatever it is, going off on its own. For a Tesla car, an example of number (2) would be if you were in the car, on either TACC or AP, minding your own biz in the center of a lane, and all of a sudden the car accelarated from 70 to 100 mph and swerved off the highway into a lake or something.

Or, another example, would be that you are going along in your lane, and a semi truck is next door, and the Tesla swerves underneath the semi.

There are no reported instances of any category "(2)" malfunctions, which I suppose is why the media is so eager to have one to report.

I don't even know if, given the stated status of TACC and AP, whether the high profile crashes even qualify as a category "(1)" since in each case the driver was obviously inattentive, and there was no evidence that the driver attempted to correct and could not override the system.

This crash is not category (1) or (2), and won't be, barring any other completely new evidence. None of the features for sale in the fleet even work on the road in question, we have the satellite images of the street for goodness sake.

Instead, we get absolutely ridiculous articles like the CR one and youtube videos about defeating the system in existence. Talk about assuming the worst of human behavior!

Every single feature rolled out to my car has made it safer, not less safe. And article after article assumes that whatever features there are will operate to make drivers more careless. Amazing, considering how careless drivers are now, I don't see how any feature could possibly make drivers as as group any more careless.

 

[alexgr]

just to be clear, adaptive crude control was not on, correct?

Also, in the article they complain that Tesla doesn’t engage with the media. It wouldn’t shock me If these new sites purposefully misquote things to get a reaction of engagement from Tesla

I don't know, of course, what was and wasn't engaged on that teslaburger.

This is the Tesla transcript:
"Our adaptive cruise control only engage when a driver was buckled in about 5 miles per hour. And it only accelerated to 30 miles per hour with the distance before the car crashed. "

This is CNN account:
"Lars Moravy, Tesla's vice president of vehicle engineering, said on the company's earnings call Monday that Tesla's adaptive cruise control was engaged and accelerated to 30 mph before the car crashed."

He did NOT say the TACC was engaged and my guess is that they made a typo in transcript and "only accelerated" should read "would only accelerate". However, it would be helpful if Lars can make a more clear statement.

Maybe Tesla just wants the reporters to look like complete fools even in the eyes of readers unfamiliar with Tesla, I don't know.

 

[BooMan]

His point is that the fact the driver's seat belt is unbuckled post crash means it eliminates the most obvious theory (they straight up did the hack that the videos show, with no driver in the seat). It leaves a fairly remote possibility that they did the hack and then decided to unbuckled the seat belt after the crash (why do so if it was the hack?) or it unbuckled itself (extremely unlikely).

Agree and get that but was just pointing out you can’t necessarily say the

Are you saying that auto wipers and traffic aware cruise control only sort of works on a Tesla?
I've never had issues with either of these on a BMW in the last decade. Nor a Tesla actually, which is why it's silly they have them in "Beta" and use the same terminology as city streets. They are really devaluing the "beta" name to have so much in that bucket. If you have a Tesla, have used TACC for years with no issues, and get told "that's beta, and so is this brand new feature" you may reasonably have people thinking that the new feature is as stable as other beta things.
Using "beta" to get out of any responsibility is kind of endemic in Tech. Google is notorious for it.

Well Auto wipers were trash the first ~year or so on my 3 but admittedly they have gotten much better the last 6 months. But my EAP still only sort of works- for example NoA seems to want to change lanes every two minutes. I would say its probably Alpha vs. Beta IMO.

 

[Electroman]

just to be clear, adaptive crude control was not on, correct?

Also, in the article they complain that Tesla doesn’t engage with the media. It wouldn’t shock me If these new sites purposefully misquote things to get a reaction of engagement from Tesla

We don't know at this time. What we know is:

• Tesla & NHTSA tested on the same road and found out that:
  • Autosteer cannot be enabled on that road.
  • TACC can be enabled after 5 mph, with seats belts buckled. And even then it will only go up to 30 mph
• Seat belts were not buckled when the fireman arrived.
• Steering wheel was deformed (indicating someone or something crashed into it)

What does this possibly mean:

• - No Autosteer in that crash
• - There had to be a driver on the driver seat
• - Driver might have buckled in, enabled TACC, pressed the accelerator to speed up
• - OR, driver might might not have buckled in, no TACC, pressed the accelerator to speed up
• - Driver then unbuckled (if already buckled) and got into the back seat to presumably to escape from back seat.

 

[Yuri_G]

I don't know, of course, what was and wasn't engaged on that teslaburger.

This is the Tesla transcript:
"Our adaptive cruise control only engage when a driver was buckled in about 5 miles per hour. And it only accelerated to 30 miles per hour with the distance before the car crashed. "

This is CNN account:
"Lars Moravy, Tesla's vice president of vehicle engineering, said on the company's earnings call Monday that Tesla's adaptive cruise control was engaged and accelerated to 30 mph before the car crashed."

He did NOT say the TACC was engaged and my guess is that they made a typo in transcript and "only accelerated" should read "would only accelerate". However, it would be helpful if Lars can make a more clear statement.

Maybe Tesla just wants the reporters to look like complete fools even in the eyes of readers unfamiliar with Tesla, I don't know.

Tesla did a study with the NTSB and NHTSA at the site of the crash and found that adaptive cruise would only accelerate to 30mph in the same distance the car in the accident traveled before the crash. Thus the likelihood of cruise control being involved is almost zero given the speed at impact was estimated to be 60-100mph.

 

[Soda Popinski]

In the case of having someone in the driver's seat, I wouldn't be surprised if they swerved to avoid a deer.