Near freeway divider collision - on autopilot

[calidreamz808]

This was a very scary 4th of July traveling experience on the 55 north / 91 east interchange while on autopilot. I’ve also included the dashcam videos for review. I also did a bug report and had a 30 min call with Tesla to report the incident. I’m on version 2019.20.4.2

Me and a passenger were heading north on the 55 north / 91 east interchange in the far left lane (not HOV) on autopilot, and the lane curved to the right slightly with a divider that sent the HOV lane toward fast track (toll lanes) when my M3 appeared to be line straight toward the divider. Luckily my hands were on the wheel (I don’t trust autopilot on ANY curve yet, and this is why) and I was able to jerk the car back into my lane.

I was numb. Me and my boyfriend both were pretty shaken up because I was going around 75-80mph and it would not have turned out well for us if I would have hit that divider. I’ve reviews these videos and each time, I start to sweat watching it. I WILL say though, the M3 handled better than any car I’ve driven in my life when jerking it back into the lane. It was a seamless and safe maneuver...but my beloved autopilot has now scared me enough that I’m afraid to use it.

Please review the videos and provide feedback. The freeway lines are very clear and I can’t see anything that would have made the car confused. No warnings. Very very scary

- front camera

- left repeater

- right repeater

 

[C141medic]

I had the same exact situation happen a few months ago and had posted about it. Mine was on the NJTPK around Newark, NJ when the car and truck lanes begin. My car decided to head straight for the middle divider separating the car and truck lanes. I think others’ have experienced similar issues. Picture below is the exact area where this occurred. The red arrow is my lane I was in and direction of travel.

 

[jdicecco]

I use autopilot 90% of the time and I trust it 90% and I love it. I don't have much to base this comment on but here is my thought.....Not an applies to applies comparison... I drive a 4 lane secondary highway with a very sharp curve. The car can take the curve fine when going 30 to 35. If I attempt to take the curve at 40 it will come out of its lane. You look to be traveling much faster than the traffic next to you and I think the car took the curve too fast. I think of autopilot like having a 15 year old new driver on your lap driving. The 15 year old will do fine most of the time but you always need to be watching, and be prepared to take over.

 

[Tam]

...line straight toward the divider...

You must be new because there have been quite a few reports of gore point divider near misses since the thread about the fatal Autopilot:

Model X Crash on US-101 (Mountain View, CA)

Just a reminder that you got what you paid for: Autopilot / FSD are "beta".

They work as designed: A competent driver is required when operating Autopilot or crashes can still occur.

Question: Do you happen to have the feature Navigation on Autopilot?

If so, would turning that on prevent this kind of near miss?

 

[KenC]

The only thing I see is that the concrete road is particularly light where the HOV line splits off, making the left lane line not as clear as it could be. In fact, the rightside of the HOV lane, the white line appears stronger. Perhaps, the AP is picking up that line as your left lane boundary, and not the actual left lane line.

 

[calidreamz808]

I use autopilot 90% of the time and I trust it 90% and I love it. I don't have much to base this comment on but here is my thought.....Not an applies to applies comparison... I drive a 4 lane secondary highway with a very sharp curve. The car can take the curve fine when going 30 to 35. If I attempt to take the curve at 40 it will come out of its lane. You look to be traveling much faster than the traffic next to you and I think the car took the curve too fast. I think of autopilot like having a 15 year old new driver on your lap driving. The 15 year old will do fine most of the time but you always need to be watching, and be prepared to take over.

It’s a mild curve but here in California if you’re going 65, which is the speed limit, it’s too slow. I can understand what you’re saying about the speed, but I feel as if that curve is so mild, the car should b able to handle it. Maybe a warning saying ok take over since it should be able to tell that the car is drifting out of the lane. I dunno, none the less, I’ve drivem this type of speed on freeways no problem on autopilot and never a problem.

 

[calidreamz808]

You must be new because there have been quite a few reports of gore point divider near misses since the thread about the fatal Autopilot:

Model X Crash on US-101 (Mountain View, CA)

Just a reminder that you got what you paid for: Autopilot / FSD are "beta".

They work as designed: A competent driver is required when operating Autopilot or crashes can still occur.

Question: Do you happen to have the feature Navigation on Autopilot?

If so, would turning that on prevent this kind of near miss?

Yea bro tam, I’m a new owner. I never said there wasn’t other videos. I’m posting my experience but thanks.

 

[calidreamz808]

Anyhow. I’m glad we are safe, and that I was doing what I’m supposed to do which is pay attention with my hands on the wheel. I’m glad that I posted this, because now I’ve learned that this little funky divider is a know sketchy situation. Now I know to stay toward middle lanes on the freeway while on autopilot just to save myself anxiety. If I wasn’t paying attention, that could have been the end to me. I feel as if normal consumers who buy a Tesla do not fumble the internet looking at forums to know this info. I sure didn’t and I DO visit this forum daily since I’ve bought the car. Informed consumer is a smart consumer.

 

[Fernand]

I think the "15 year old driver" is pretty accurate. But that 15 year old chauffeur is pretty good and still saves me a lot of "work". It did take me a few months to really get the hang of it and know when to engage/turn off which modes, and when to be be especially attentive.

Everyone needs to work out the most comfortable standard hand position to cover any situation, whether in NOA, AS or taking over in manual. For me it's the right hand on the wheel at the 3 o'clock position, with my elbow on the console. I can fully control the car from there, steering, changing top speed and follow distance, engaging automation and, very important, flipping the wand up to disengage ALL automation.

Because the most dangerous thing I've run into is dropping out of AS/NOA without knowing it, but remaining in TACC. Not saying it's what happened to the OP, but I've had that happen when I jerked the wheel in response to a "nag", and then thought the car was deliberately steering me into the shoulder. The car seemed to be "driving itself", everything seemed ok, except it wasn't steering! It would tend to make people very very very disappointed with the AP's steering - if it wasn't even engaged. Very important to be on the alert for that, keep one eye on the blue AS/NOA lines on the display.

 

[WilliamG]

The only thing I see is that the concrete road is particularly light where the HOV line splits off, making the left lane line not as clear as it could be. In fact, the rightside of the HOV lane, the white line appears stronger. Perhaps, the AP is picking up that line as your left lane boundary, and not the actual left lane line.

I agree with this. This is one of those fringe cases where I can totally see WHY it failed. Even I was confused by the lines on the left side for a moment.

While it may be useful for Tesla to see it, I don’t think this is a bug at all - just a limitation of autopilot and what it and the cameras can see. The dark road turned to light road along with that white line splitting off to the left of the median - a recipe for autopilot disaster.

Glad you’re safe.

 

[ngogas]

@calidreamz808 dang this video makes me cringe too. Imagine hitting that at 75 mph. You need to alert Tesla if this video. Maybe it will help them get this use case out of the way.

 

[ecarfan]

@calidreamz808 dang this video makes me cringe too. Imagine hitting that at 75 mph. You need to alert Tesla if this video. Maybe it will help them get this use case out of the way.

If you read the OP you will see that she had a 30 minute phone call with Tesla and sent in a bug report, so they are aware.

I have driven that interchange many times. The OP made a very smooth recovery. Yet another real world incident to remind us all to pay attention and keep our hand/hands on the wheel while using AP and NOA. Thanks.

 

[Tam]

...Yea bro tam, I’m a new owner. I never said there wasn’t other videos. I’m posting my experience but thanks.

It would be useful if you bought FSD so you might want to test whether Navigation on Autopilot would help for this location.

 

[RedModel3]

I've had my car for a year, so I'm pretty used to where I can and can't trust AP right now. (I don't have FSD). This is exactly one of those places where I learned very early, very much like you, where I couldn't trust AP. As for NOA, the only place I would use it is on a cross country road trip, but never in a congested area. Three interstates intersect in downtown Nashville, and it creates a giant traffic circle. There is no way to stay in one lane, or even two, to get anywhere. Unless you have FSD, you MUST be ready to control the car at all times when it's on AP. There are still bugs to be worked out, like the sudden braking for no apparent reason in the middle of a sunny day, usually coming up to overpasses. Keep in mind that we are still on the bleeding edge of this new technology. One other point to keep in mind is that there may be times where what your car does while on AP will piss off other drivers. I found out early on that in slow bumper to bumper traffic, even if I adjusted my following distance, it pissed off other drivers if I wasn't as close to the car in front of me as they thought I should be. AP doesn't respond as quickly as I would, especially when passing.

With time, you'll know when and how to use this with your driving style. Just don't expect it to drive for you. At least not yet!

 

[FoverM]

The freeway lanes are not clear to a computer. Look at the contrast of the two sides of the Y around 0:14 in the video. The exit lane's line is white on dark - tons of contrast for the computer to see. Your lane's line is white on light gray - not much contrast. Now the software has to decide, "where is the left side of my lane", and in this case it decided that the left side was the high contrast line in the exit. Also note that the exit lane is "straighter" ahead than your actual lane, which curves off to the right, so when the software's confused it may be designed to choose the straighter path.

At some point the computer has to decide what to do ... and computers are extremely stupid machines. They have no awareness of the big picture. At a minimum, the computer needs to have precise mapping of the lanes and exits, where they go, which one you're in, and the intent of each lane. In this case, you were in a lane that did *not* exit the freeway, so the computer should be looking to the right side for lane markers, not the left side.

 

[borugee]

They work as designed: A competent driver is required when operating Autopilot or crashes can still occur.

Question: Do you happen to have the feature Navigation on Autopilot?

If so, would turning that on prevent this kind of near miss?

I have similar experience. One issue is AP don't know wheather to go left or right without NoA. (Not right design.). I would say, AP should be programmed with a priority for every fork to go either left or right.

 

[Msjulie]

@calidreamz808 Glad you were paying attention, I agree with others that compare AP to a teen driver.

For me personally (and probably an unpopular view) is the only places I feel that AP reduces driving stress are roads like CA 5 with miles of 2 lane long boring nothing - the perfect place where a person may have their mind wander a bit ... in any case, where there are varied road conditions, exits or other 'challenges' - and things to keep an attentive driver focused - AP stresses me out far more than driving myself for exactly the kind of situations your video shows.

The more you use AP the more you'll learn where it can and can't cope in your normal driving situations. If Tesla responds further, please report back. In my most-scary report, service reminded me it's beta software. Fair enough but a little letdown on details there...

 

[Dana1]

This was a very scary 4th of July traveling experience on the 55 north / 91 east interchange while on autopilot. I’ve also included the dashcam videos for review. I also did a bug report and had a 30 min call with Tesla to report the incident. I’m on version 2019.20.4.2

Me and a passenger were heading north on the 55 north / 91 east interchange in the far left lane (not HOV) on autopilot, and the lane curved to the right slightly with a divider that sent the HOV lane toward fast track (toll lanes) when my M3 appeared to be line straight toward the divider. Luckily my hands were on the wheel (I don’t trust autopilot on ANY curve yet, and this is why) and I was able to jerk the car back into my lane.

I was numb. Me and my boyfriend both were pretty shaken up because I was going around 75-80mph and it would not have turned out well for us if I would have hit that divider. I’ve reviews these videos and each time, I start to sweat watching it. I WILL say though, the M3 handled better than any car I’ve driven in my life when jerking it back into the lane. It was a seamless and safe maneuver...but my beloved autopilot has now scared me enough that I’m afraid to use it.

Please review the videos and provide feedback. The freeway lines are very clear and I can’t see anything that would have made the car confused. No warnings. Very very scary

- front camera

- left repeater

- right repeater

It’s beta technology. This is why we’re told to monitor it and be prepared to take over. It keeps getting better with every mile, glad you put bug report in as a situation to be reviewed.

 

[JulienW]

This was a very scary 4th of July traveling experience on the 55 north / 91 east interchange while on autopilot. I’ve also included the dashcam videos for review. I also did a bug report and had a 30 min call with Tesla to report the incident. I’m on version 2019.20.4.2

Me and a passenger were heading north on the 55 north / 91 east interchange in the far left lane (not HOV) on autopilot, and the lane curved to the right slightly with a divider that sent the HOV lane toward fast track (toll lanes) when my M3 appeared to be line straight toward the divider. Luckily my hands were on the wheel (I don’t trust autopilot on ANY curve yet, and this is why) and I was able to jerk the car back into my lane.....

Do you live close and can you repeat the drive? If not does anyone else live in the area that can give it a try and see if it is a one off mistake or if it repeatable and happens all the time.

 

[Saghost]

Did the car actually cross the lane lines?

Watching the video, I had the impression it was still basically centered on the lane when you intervened and the geometry just made the path head towards the barrier for a bit.

Given the markings I saw on the video, I'd be very surprised if a modern firmware version failed to make the turn, but the car doesn't shy away from obstacles like a human would...