Model X with child in drivers seat allegedly injures woman

[aesculus]

The mystery here seems to be the weight on the seat (or perhaps Mom left the seat belt buckled). Perhaps the kid was kicking the seat cushion while lodged between the seat and pedals? Or Mom has a heavy purse and left in the seat, perhaps. Or moved the car seat to the driver's seat.

This^^^^

I buy the rest of the story and can certainly see how the toddler climbed through the open FWD, over the center console into the drivers footwell where it played against both the brake and accelerator while pulling down on the gear shifter. But not being the driver's seat with sufficient weight seems that should have prevented the car from moving. That part I cannot understand unless the seat sensor was not working as designed or she left a heavy object on the seat. Maybe I am missing something else but this has me stumped.

 

[MXWing]

This^^^^

I buy the rest of the story and can certainly see how the toddler climbed through the open FWD, over the center console into the drivers footwell where it played against both the brake and accelerator while pulling down on the gear shifter. But not being the driver's seat with sufficient weight seems that should have prevented the car from moving. That part I cannot understand unless the seat sensor was not working as designed or she left a heavy object on the seat. Maybe I am missing something else but this has me stumped.

It's a tragic accident borne of negligence from the parent. There is literally nothing else to see here.

I would love to be on that jury.

I’d probably get removed due to “preemptory challenge”

Oh? You have a Model X and your young kids didn’t run you over?

GTFO’ta here.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

That part I cannot understand unless the seat sensor was not working as designed or she left a heavy object on the seat.

The child could have also plugged in the seat belt instead, but that does seem less likely.
In any case, exactly. And that is why Tesla will likely settle this lawsuit; the object was unlikely to be 75 pounds - a heavy bag of groceries plus purse is not enough to trigger the car to turn the passenger airbag on (try it yourself). So, it should also not be enough to disengage the driver seat interlock to allow putting the car in drive.

 

[gnuarm]

I suppose this same mom has loaded firearms lying around the house, and her next suit will be against a gun manufacturer for making it too easy for her toddler to shoot her.

Sometimes, people need to accept that their decision to leave a child completely unsupervised with access to dangerous things like matches, knives, guns, cars, electrical outlets, medication, hard candy, Drano, doors, mousetraps, ink pens, scissors, q tips, fishing hooks, hammers, pillows, glass, magnets, clothes hangers, rope, etc is a risk and can have potentially bad consequences. Literally everything is dangerous in the wrong hands at the wrong moment even if it has been deemed child safe. There is no such thing. Don't want the risk, don't leave them unsupervised or start early and teach the individual responsibility ... clearly that won't happen if we allow everything to get "fixed" in this lady's very American way of not accepting any responsibility.

That sounds great doesn't it. But you ignore that things like guns, electrical outlets and especially cars are easy to make safe. A gun should never be outside of the gun safe if it isn't being used or maintained. Electrical outlets now have guards to keep kids from poking stuff into them. Cars, for the most part, require a key to operate. There's the issue. Is it safe enough for the key to be something you can so easily leave in the car? I often forget and leave my phone in the car, but then it's not my key. I keep the fob in my pocket.

 

[SammichLover]

You are probably right that it definitely could happen - it happened here after all...but...

Your child would also need to know to plug the seat belt in (without him in the seat) to be able to get the car to move - assuming the interlocks work the way Tesla says and a driver’s weight must be detected in the driver seat.

Seatbelt isn’t required. And the seat interlock requires little force. I’m in a test mood today so just confirmed in my Model 3.

Placed a 7.2lb “gym bag”** on the seat, door closed, foot on the pedal, and gear selector put it into D. (Also in Hold, because I don’t use Creep).


** AKA my burse (bus purse, it has all my driving gear, license & certs, etc).

 

[gnuarm]

Seatbelt isn’t required. And the seat interlock requires little force. I’m in a test mood today so just confirmed in my Model 3.

Placed a 7.2lb “gym bag”** on the seat, door closed, foot on the pedal, and gear selector put it into D. (Also in Hold, because I don’t use Creep).


** AKA my burse (bus purse, it has all my driving gear, license & certs, etc).

So the kid could have been in the footwell, put one hand on the seat and used the other hand to grab the shifter with a foot or two (or even his butt) on the brake pedal while climbing out of the foot well. Seems very possible.

BTW, how did you press the brake pedal from inside without being in the seat? I guess you have long arms or you stood on your head?

I've worked on projects where you have "use cases" to develop your spec and this is a tough one to anticipate. But a 7 lb gym bag should not activate the seat weight detector. I don't get why that is so low. Maybe that is the case for the passenger seats to disable the air bags?

BTW, how did you reach the brake pedal without being in the seat? Are your arms that long or did you stand on your head?

 

[Daniel in SD]

Seatbelt isn’t required. And the seat interlock requires little force. I’m in a test mood today so just confirmed in my Model 3.

Placed a 7.2lb “gym bag”** on the seat, door closed, foot on the pedal, and gear selector put it into D. (Also in Hold, because I don’t use Creep).


** AKA my burse (bus purse, it has all my driving gear, license & certs, etc).

Does the key need to be inside the car?
Would you suggest that everyone who’s not using pin to drive and has small children have CPS called?

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Placed a 7.2lb “gym bag”** on the seat, door closed, foot on the pedal, and gear selector put it into D. (Also in Hold, because I don’t use Creep).

Glad you did the test - was going to do it myself later. I did say “assuming the interlocks work the way Tesla says and a driver’s weight must be detected in the driver seat” - that is what a safe system would require... Tesla specifically says the driver's seat MUST "detect an occupant". A 7 pound bag is NOT an occupant.

This is EXACTLY what I suspected - this sensor (at least the one on the passenger side - I am assuming it is the same for the driver side - see page 45 in the Model X owners manual) is capable of detecting the amount of weight...but they are not using that feature (assuming Model 3 and Model X use the same programming & logic of course). There is no reason not to use the available information though - a very, very, light driver (less than 100 pounds) could still drive by plugging in the seat belt and closing the door.

So a clear safety issue that Tesla will likely patch in software. And of course, they will likely settle the suit, for the same logical reason.

Here are the passenger occupancy sensor specs (obviously the assumption is that the driver's sensor is the same - which it may or may not be - but it apparently should be!):

 

[Nocturnal]

I have young kids that are overly curious, profoundly gifted and zero self control.

With that said, an accident that takes 1 second to execute, I can’t stop. That is life.

A kid getting away from me to where they can climb into a car, and run my ass over?

That is horrid parenting through and through.

More than sufficient time to get your kid under control.

I'm not giving her a pass, just saying that it's understandable. People make mistakes, this was a big one.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Seatbelt isn’t required.

Yes, it absolutely IS required, if the seat sensor is not activated. You can test it! I'm just going off of what Tesla says in the Owner's Manual here. But I think I understand what you meant - given the weak threshold for the seat sensor, no, the seatbelt is not required, as long as the driver door is also closed.

 

[Mr. Jim]

Santa Barbara Mom Sues Tesla After Model X Accident

 

[Mr. Jim]

Sorry if that was a clickbait title, but this just gets to me:

New lawsuit against Tesla alleges that a Model X pinned a pregnant woman against a wall, breaking her bones and sending her into premature labor (TSLA)

My news aggregator showed me that story last night since it knows I enjoy reading Tesla news, and it just makes me sick. I mean we clearly have a case of a woman that had no control over her two year old child and the child drove the car into her. I know this may sound harsh, and I sympathize with the difficulty of being a parent (I have three young kids myself), but it's fools like this that want to make the entire world idiot proof that prevent decent individuals from having nice things. This is not the view of a Tesla apologist; rather, it's a plea for people in these types of situations to own responsibility for their (and their children's) actions. This could be any car company and it would be just as wrong.

/rant

Why was the child taken out of the car seat if mom was going to be away?

 

[Fellsteruk]

Why does this not read “...stupid ass mum...”

And sadly it’s all over the place when the story should be about irresponsible parenting

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Why was the child taken out of the car seat if mom was going to be away?

It was alleged that the mom and B.H. went into the house together to change B.H.'s diaper. But B.H. quickly ran back to the Tesla since had other things he preferred to be doing over having his diaper changed. The exact sequence that is alleged to have occurred is described in the Scribd document in the original link.

 

[SammichLover]

[

Yes, it absolutely IS required, if the seat sensor is not activated. You can test it! I'm just going off of what Tesla says in the Owner's Manual here. But I think I understand what you meant - given the weak threshold for the seat sensor, no, the seatbelt is not required, as long as the driver door is also closed.

I trust you on what the Owner’s Manual says but that’s not actual.

I have some thoughts on weight, about how it is much grayer than you imply.

PS FYI Mostly good news for you on LDA, lane-line banshee of 8.6 appears vanquished. Still got a noise out of it on Assist, but that might be for second correction w/o driver input. Needs more testing. More detail tonight when i’m back home.

 

[gnuarm]

It was alleged that the mom and B.H. went into the house together to change B.H.'s diaper. But B.H. quickly ran back to the Tesla since had other things he preferred to be doing over having his diaper changed. The exact sequence that is alleged to have occurred is described in the Scribd document in the original link.

B.H. ???

 

[Daniel in SD]

B.H. ???

The 2 year old. They withhold the name of minors.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I trust you on what the Owner’s Manual says but that’s not actual.

That is entirely possible/likely. I did some testing and it appears to be MUCH less strict than alleged by Tesla. Which is unfortunate.

Based on what happens in my car, it does not seem difficult at all for a two-year-old to kill someone with it.

I can start my Model 3 (12.1.2) and drive as follows:

Open driver door
No seat belt
Not sitting in driver’s seat!!! (NOTHING in the seat)

Literally NONE of the conditions that Tesla alleges are required, are actually required, at least some of the time.

This seems...bad.

It is weird because SOMETIMES it does automatically put the car in park (I have had it happen), but it seems to be somewhat complicated logic.

EDIT:

Worked it out! In creep mode, if you do NOT press the accelerator, it will put the car in park to prevent rollaway after the car rolls a bit. If you press the accelerator it just goes!

Also, all this can be done with the (phone) "key" on the ground outside the car. My Highlander and Chevy Sparks, all of which have keyless pushbutton start, DEFINITELY do not allow that. They know when the key is actually in the car, and will not allow the car to start if it is not present!

 

[SammichLover]

B.H. ???

Bad Hombre, obviously!

 

[SammichLover]

That is entirely possible/likely. I did some testing and it appears to be MUCH less strict than alleged. Which is unfortunate.

Based on what happens in my car, it does not seem difficult at all for a two-year-old to kill someone with it.

I can start my Model 3 (12.1.2) and drive as follows:

Open driver door
No seat belt
Not sitting in driver’s seat.

Literally NONE of the conditions that Tesla alleges are required, at least some of the time.

This seems...bad.

It is weird because SOMETIMES it does automatically put the car in park (I have had it happen), but it seems to be somewhat complicated logic.

Door open + no seatbelt + movement starts = always slam into P in my past experience.