There's a thread in another automotive forum I'm a member of talking about how young people these days don't have a clue about how cars work and how to look after them. Not knowing what an oil pressure warning light means (it was referred to as the 'genie lamp' or 'gravy boat' by a couple of clueless drivers), not being able to carry out the simplest maintenance tasks such as checking tyre pressures, topping up the washer bottle, all that sort of thing.
There were a few anecdotes where drivers had accidents and in every case it was the car's fault, or because there was mysterious disappearing 'oil' on the road, or in one case due to rain causing the car to end up on it's roof (that must have been one hell of a shower!)
It's debatable whether these issues only apply to young drivers, but on the whole it does seem as though a lot of people these days have no interest how a car works, no idea what actually happens when something goes wrong and no idea how to correct it. They just treat cars like any other 'device', so the owner's manual is never opened and it's up to the garage or a more responsible adult to put things right for them.
That may be fine for devices such as phones, computers and washing machines but cars (at their current stage of development) require a more responsible attitude, so I agree with others here that more driver education is needed. That goes for all cars, not just Teslas and especially for those with new advanced driving aids.
An example - ABS is now fitted to almost every new car, yet most drivers don't ever press the brake pedal hard enough to utilise it in an emergency and even if they do, they don't understand that you can still steer the car when it operates. Most drivers haven't been shown how it works and explaining the principle of it goes over most people's heads anyway. It's a safety feature which needs to be demonstrated for a driver to use it properly.
Some very high performance road cars come with driver training. There seems to be no shortage of wealthy but inexperienced motorists out there buying Ferraris, McLarens, Porsches, Bugattis etc. and some of these supercars end up being totalled or in a fatal crash very soon after leaving the showroom. Rarely (unless a celebrity is involved) do those stories make national news. It's taken for granted that anyone with enough money should be able to buy a car with massive performance and drive it on the road with a regular drivers license, so when those accidents happen, there's no big backlash. There's always lots of debate about gun control, but we don't hear much debate about car control.
So, we do seem to be experiencing a backlash against Tesla at the moment which I feel is mainly media-driven and I'm sure will subside, but we should also look objectively at what's happening here and see if we can learn from the experience.
I personally would welcome some one-to-one Autopilot training if I choose to have it when I get my Model 3 (I'm by no means convinced I actually NEED AP yet). What I mean is more training than you would get on a short test drive on normal roads. Something on a test track or skid pan where the limits of the car and it's driver aids could be explored and real life scenarios tested out before the driver gets into a real situation they don't know how to get out of.
There's more of this sort of training being offered by car manufacturers these days, partly because the cars and their safety systems are becoming more complex and partly because it promotes them as being concerned about their customer's wellbeing. It can only help.
I've been involved in high performance driver training myself and one thing it taught me very early on is that there is a very high proportion of drivers on the roads, some of them with many years of experience, who just don't understand the basic concepts of car control, accident avoidance, hazard perception and planning ahead.
I believe more intensive driver training should at least be offered when a Tesla is purchased (I'm assuming that doesn't happen now, but correct me if I'm wrong). There's no need to disable or restrict the use of Autopilot as long as the driver knows how to use it properly. We can see from cases like the OP that not all Tesla drivers do and currently they don't have enough motivation or opportunity to find out.
There were a few anecdotes where drivers had accidents and in every case it was the car's fault, or because there was mysterious disappearing 'oil' on the road, or in one case due to rain causing the car to end up on it's roof (that must have been one hell of a shower!)
It's debatable whether these issues only apply to young drivers, but on the whole it does seem as though a lot of people these days have no interest how a car works, no idea what actually happens when something goes wrong and no idea how to correct it. They just treat cars like any other 'device', so the owner's manual is never opened and it's up to the garage or a more responsible adult to put things right for them.
That may be fine for devices such as phones, computers and washing machines but cars (at their current stage of development) require a more responsible attitude, so I agree with others here that more driver education is needed. That goes for all cars, not just Teslas and especially for those with new advanced driving aids.
An example - ABS is now fitted to almost every new car, yet most drivers don't ever press the brake pedal hard enough to utilise it in an emergency and even if they do, they don't understand that you can still steer the car when it operates. Most drivers haven't been shown how it works and explaining the principle of it goes over most people's heads anyway. It's a safety feature which needs to be demonstrated for a driver to use it properly.
Some very high performance road cars come with driver training. There seems to be no shortage of wealthy but inexperienced motorists out there buying Ferraris, McLarens, Porsches, Bugattis etc. and some of these supercars end up being totalled or in a fatal crash very soon after leaving the showroom. Rarely (unless a celebrity is involved) do those stories make national news. It's taken for granted that anyone with enough money should be able to buy a car with massive performance and drive it on the road with a regular drivers license, so when those accidents happen, there's no big backlash. There's always lots of debate about gun control, but we don't hear much debate about car control.
So, we do seem to be experiencing a backlash against Tesla at the moment which I feel is mainly media-driven and I'm sure will subside, but we should also look objectively at what's happening here and see if we can learn from the experience.
I personally would welcome some one-to-one Autopilot training if I choose to have it when I get my Model 3 (I'm by no means convinced I actually NEED AP yet). What I mean is more training than you would get on a short test drive on normal roads. Something on a test track or skid pan where the limits of the car and it's driver aids could be explored and real life scenarios tested out before the driver gets into a real situation they don't know how to get out of.
There's more of this sort of training being offered by car manufacturers these days, partly because the cars and their safety systems are becoming more complex and partly because it promotes them as being concerned about their customer's wellbeing. It can only help.
I've been involved in high performance driver training myself and one thing it taught me very early on is that there is a very high proportion of drivers on the roads, some of them with many years of experience, who just don't understand the basic concepts of car control, accident avoidance, hazard perception and planning ahead.
I believe more intensive driver training should at least be offered when a Tesla is purchased (I'm assuming that doesn't happen now, but correct me if I'm wrong). There's no need to disable or restrict the use of Autopilot as long as the driver knows how to use it properly. We can see from cases like the OP that not all Tesla drivers do and currently they don't have enough motivation or opportunity to find out.
