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

[qdeathstar]

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

people who are unfamiliar with Tesla don’t care about the correction that isn’t posted on CNN later on....

 

[HAILERS]

Just saying.......this day I saw a (I believe) Consumer Report where they drove a Tesla on autopilot on a course with dividing lines, and the driver got into the passenger seat and the car kept driving. They had a 'weight' attached to the left side of the steering wheel and seat belt buckled.

imho Autopilot is a waste and Mercedes does the same lane keeping/ adaptive criuisee etc. NOT worth ten grand more for the car. I've a Tesla S Performance, by the way. What's wrong with people these days? Can't keep their eyes fwd and hands on the wheel? Incredible.

 

[HAILERS]

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.

Tell ya what. Go to Texas and get on I-20 headed west. Start in say, Gorden, Texas and head up Ranger Hill with the nav set for someplace like El Paso etc. I guarantee you that Tesla S Performance will practically stop half way up Ranger Hill because it's soooo confused as to where the road goes. No Jag or Mercedes ever did this to me. Heck, throw in the Porsche too.

 

[finman100]

That's an old Toyota Supra. (the explosion in TX). Why is Toyota not on trial yet?

 

[MikeyC]

We've gone from debating about whether or not there was a driver, to debating about whether or not Autopilot was turned on, to debating about what Autopilot even IS! To me, given what was posted on a prior page from the Tesla website, TACC is a subset of Autopilot so TACC in and of itself is not Autopilot.

But I don't think any of these semantic arguments are going to matter in the end. What they will be looking at will have nothing to do with whether TACC can or cannot be called Autopilot. They'll likely be looking at whether or not some features of the car encouraged the owner to perform dangerous actions. As such, they may look at the possibility the owner thought the car was steering itself when it was not, whether or not to make a recommendation that the action that engages autosteer should be separate from the action that engages TACC (rather than AP being essentially performing the TACC action twice), whether there should be more clear driver indications about when the car is actually autosteering, etc.

This will likely be done in conjunction with (but not depending on) the actual crash scene investigation regarding what the driver did and how much fault lies with the driver versus the car.

Mike

 

[alexgr]

That's an old Toyota Supra. (the explosion in TX). Why is Toyota not on trial yet?

Yeh, Toyota just announced they are going to build big SUVs in the US. Is the Congress going to allow Toyota to kill Americans by truckloads?

 

[JHCCAZ]

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.

I don't think there's a typo in the transcript.The problem is that Mr. Moravi was not clear in setting up what he was explaining.

When he said AP would not engage on that road, and that TACC only accelerated to 30 miles per hour (which yes he did say), I believe he was referring to an experiment conducted by Tesla and/or the investigators, at the location but days after the crash. (Presumably at night to mimic the conditions of the accident, though no one actually said that AFAIK).

The problem is that he didn't start by making it clear that a re-creation test was done, and then further clarify that the past-tense reference (re 30mph on TACC) was in regards to the re-creation, not the original accident.

If one is plugged in to this story at all, it's obvious that such details are critical to untangle an already messy batch of statements and poor reporting.

In other words, the Tesla guy certainly wasn't clear, but it was obvious and important that he wasn't clear. But rather than asking for the clarification first, the "news" story ran with a garbled and incorrect re-telling.

Motivation for this lack of checking can be debated, but I just find it incredibly disturbing that "reporters" seem to compete on on just how much they can mis-report.

 

[alexgr]

We've gone from debating about whether or not there was a driver, to debating about whether or not Autopilot was turned on, to debating about what Autopilot even IS! To me, given what was posted on a prior page from the Tesla website, TACC is a subset of Autopilot so TACC in and of itself is not Autopilot.

But I don't think any of these semantic arguments are going to matter in the end. What they will be looking at will have nothing to do with whether TACC can or cannot be called Autopilot. They'll likely be looking at whether or not some features of the car encouraged the owner to perform dangerous actions. As such, they may look at the possibility the owner thought the car was steering itself when it was not, whether or not to make a recommendation that the action that engages autosteer should be separate from the action that engages TACC (rather than AP being essentially performing the TACC action twice), whether there should be more clear driver indications about when the car is actually autosteering, etc.

This will likely be done in conjunction with (but not depending on) the actual crash scene investigation regarding what the driver did and how much fault lies with the driver versus the car.

Mike

Looking at a knife and the instructions how quickly it can slice muscles to the bone ....
Looking at a handgun and instructions that it is perfect to use when feeling unsafe ...

 

[EVNow]

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

If only this is all captured on video and saved ... that can be salvaged.

 

[SVMike]

People can have their eyes on the road and be lost in thought. I think on some long drives that’s particularly true. No way to monitor for that.

Brain wave monitoring

 

[finman100]

neuralink. it's an entire, integrated system from elon: solar, storage, EV...and your brain to wirelessly control it all!

 

[EVNow]

I don't think there's a typo in the transcript.The problem is that Mr. Moravi was not clear in setting up what he was explaining.

Considering the importance - that was poorly explained. They could have put out a properly explained blog post - which they haven't done.

Sometimes, Musk just complains about media rather than actually take measures to counter the misinformation.

 

[qdeathstar]

When is musk gonna tackle teleportation??

 

[rxlawdude]

hey'll likely be looking at whether or not some features of the car encouraged the owner to perform dangerous actions. As such, they may look at the possibility the owner thought the car was steering itself when it was not, whether or not to make a recommendation that the action that engages autosteer should be separate from the action that engages TACC (rather than AP being essentially performing the TACC action twice), whether there should be more clear driver indications about when the car is actually autosteering, etc.

This will likely be done in conjunction with (but not depending on) the actual crash scene investigation regarding what the driver did and how much fault lies with the driver versus the car.

When is musk gonna tackle teleportation??

It'll be easier on Mars. Less gravity.

 

[CyberGus]

just to be clear, adaptive crude control was not on

Wow, I didn't know the fart-noises were adaptive

 

[qdeathstar]

Wow, I didn't know the fart-noises were adaptive

well, yea.

 

[SMAlset]

Hopefully the expediting and release of the preliminary report sooner than a month as reported a number of posts ago here will answer a lot of questions. I’m assuming Tesla was not made a “party” to the investigation, just cooperating with authorities, so wasn’t gagged about making statements like they had been with the Mt View 101 accident. I can understand Elon and Tesla’s wanting to offer a correction to some of the false or misleading news reporting as I can see this accident impacting the company both in the public view and also the stock price for investors. Best for news to be based on the facts not faulty suppositions.

One of the things that kind of bothered me early on that I don’t think has been commented on was how the constable’s office was reported to have demanded the logs from Tesla. I believe this is SOP in accident cases either by police, insurance or lawyers. I’m also pretty sure that the only way Tesla (or any car company involved in an accident) turns over the logs is legally by warrant or subpoena due to privacy rights. To me the terminology used made it sound like it wouldn’t be forthcoming by Tesla so had to demanded putting Tesla in a more negative light. Just my impression and might not have bothered others.

 

[Tam]

...the constable’s office was reported to have demanded the logs from Tesla...

I think when the police made a false statement that Tesla could have easily corrected that with a car log, Tesla could have worked with the police behind the scene so the police could have issued a correction with Tesla's prepared presentation.

It's fine that Tesla issued a public rebuttal, but it would have been more powerful if the police would issue a correction themselves with Tesla's help.

Since Tesla chose to verbally talk about the log publically (without showing the log) to contradict the police so it's reasonable for the police to want to see the log themselves.

It was necessary for the police to plan to ask for a warrant at that time but I think they might no longer need to do that since NTSB is now taking over the investigation and the police is now a party to the investigation, no longer the chief investigator.

It is now the responsibility of the NTSB (not the police) to get the log and Tesla has historically complied and there's no reason to believe it won't this time either.

 

[qdeathstar]

I think when the police made a false statement that Tesla could have easily corrected that with a car log, Tesla could have worked with the police behind the scene so the police could have issued a correction with Tesla's prepared presentation.

It's fine that Tesla issued a public rebuttal, but it would have been more powerful if the police would issue a correction themselves with Tesla's help.

Why do you think the police would be willing to issue a oopsie?

They kill people all the time and never seem to want to fess up.... so If they won’t do it for murder I don’t they would for a car accident.

 

[SMAlset]

Just read through the Fire Marshall’s report on the accident. There’s a Scribd document of it on Jalopnik’s site at the bottom of their webpage:

Fire Marshal's Report Offers A Few More Clues About That Deadly Tesla Crash

There are still a lot of unanswered questions about the deadly crash of a Tesla Model S near Houston on April 17, including whether Tesla’s driver assistance system, Autopilot, had any role and whether anyone was in the driver’s seat when the crash occurred. A new report from the local fire...

jalopnik.com