Totalled my S today....so I confirmed my Model 3 First Production order

[brucet999]

I think it's safe to say if this was a Tesla on autopilot it would've been avoided. I think? But let's say you have full Autopilot but it's not switched on - will it still engage and veer to avoid this type of collision on its own? I hope so!

What, exactly, do you think AutoPilot would have done that OP did not? She drove clear off the road and was struck while on the shoulder. Standing on the brakes would have kept her in the "line of fire" longer, possible for a head-on. Swerving harder to the right would likely have launched her off the embankment.

 

[Petra]

@Az_Rael I'm glad to hear you're alright.

I'll miss seeing that red Model S of yours around town. On the bright side, you may very well end up with the first Model 3 in the Antelope Valley

 

[NeverFollow]

This is why I will never drive in the UK. I don't trust myself to remember which side of the road to drive on.

Even worse when you are a pedestrian, because when crossing a road,
you are used to look on your left instead of looking on your right when in U.K.!!!!

 

[Az_Rael]

Wow


Glad you're okay but I'm really saying Wow because just by watching that, in my opinion, that could have been avoided, I would have went left.

20/20 hindsight. The assumption I made was that he would see me and correct by swerving to his right (my left), which would be normal driver behavior. If I had swerved left, and he had corrected back to his lane (again, normal driver behavior), we would have hit head on. A very risky move on my part.

The only thing I might have done differently was to accelerate. I might have been able to thread the gap to the right before he got all the way into my lane. But I was swerving onto dirt and wasn’t confident of the traction when doing that.

 

[Az_Rael]

Did get a minor update today. My car has been moved out of the tow company lot, but they are still waiting on an estimate of the damages, apparently.

I have gotten an approval for a credit union loan on my 3 and have applied via Tesla as well. Getting a little concerned that the 3 will be ready before my insurance claim has settled. Which is a good problem to have, LOL.

Weirdly, I am wondering if the infamous Mr. Whompy Wheels will eventually find the salvage auction photos showing my rear wheel missing, which MUST have been why I crashed.

 

[Petra]

I am wondering if the infamous Mr. Whompy Wheels will eventually find the salvage auction photos showing my rear wheel missing, which MUST have been why I crashed.

I was thinking the same thing...

 

[Az_Rael]

Another update today, the insurance company called and "needs more photos" from Copart due to the "high value" of my car. So it is going to take a couple more days apparently and they haven't made the call to total it yet.

Tesla called as well with my financing offer. They approved me for 2.54% for 60 months, so I am going to stick with my credit union that got me 2.24%. She was going to turn in my paperwork and transfer me to my DS.

Hopefully the insurance company will pull the trigger on totaling the car soon.

 

[Az_Rael]

OK, one more update, I am now scheduled for delivery 1/6! I thought about delaying until I knew more about the insurance settlement, but decided to schedule anyway. Will just pull $$ out of savings for the downpayment and pay it back once everything clears.

 

[hmmm]

I'm not sure why you say that, rollovers in collisions between two sedans, even at those speeds and angles are extremely uncommon.

I'm really glad the OP is okay. The person who hit them is an extremely irresponsible person. This looks like a combination of distracted driving as well as someone who was driving uninsured.

The cops aren't going to do squat about it even with the damning dash cam video. They've got bigger fish to fry like writing tickets for people going 10mph over the speed limit. Because everyone "walked away" this is really no big deal to them. Speaking from experience when my wife was rear-ended by a driver with no insurance and no license and the cops just didn't care about it.

OP insurance company might go after them through wage garnishment or other legal means considering the size of this claim. However the OP might best be served by retaining their own lawyer and suing the owner of the vehicle... who, I guess, if they are smart will claim the car was stolen.

This is also why we carry a 2M umbrella and I really urge everyone to have one. We could loan our car to someone and they could do something like this that results in a major tragedy that would go out of scope of our regular coverage.

+1 on fat umbrella policy.

 

[EV-lutioin]

Not to mention the emotional baggage it may have placed on az_rael if the other had died. When AZ has his own dreams he will be able to wake from them knowing that the split second action he took saved a life rather than being involved in taking one.

I am glad everyone walked away. That video is scary enough.

I second this... fantastic response by the MS driver to avoid a head-on collision, may have saved two lives.

 

[Beckler]

What, exactly, do you think AutoPilot would have done that OP did not?

I'm not sure - whatever solution it calculated. It should notice it much sooner, maybe brake hard and keep moving max right side - there was room. Or just cross center line...easy. I don't know if it's this smart yet but clearly any number of solutions that are impractical (effectively impossible) for humans to come up with in real time.

 

[Moderatefan]

20/20 hindsight. The assumption I made was that he would see me and correct by swerving to his right (my left), which would be normal driver behavior. If I had swerved left, and he had corrected back to his lane (again, normal driver behavior), we would have hit head on. A very risky move on my part.

The only thing I might have done differently was to accelerate. I might have been able to thread the gap to the right before he got all the way into my lane. But I was swerving onto dirt and wasn’t confident of the traction when doing that.

The interesting question is do you really want to defer the solution of this situation to AP/FSD. What if AP swerved left and the other driver stopped texting(or whatever) and tried to get back on the right side of the road and then head on/death (sorry, trying to abstract away).
Or if the AP tried to do the same as the driver did (and I doubt it would consider driving on grass to avoid) and then you get the same collision... Most likely everybody would be sueing Tesla for the outcome of the accident... Is it really their responsibility / decision to make?

 

[Super_Popular]

Dang!

 

[Moderatefan]

The interesting question is do you really want to defer the solution of this situation to AP/FSD. What if AP swerved left and the other driver stopped texting(or whatever) and tried to get back on the right side of the road and then head on/death (sorry, trying to abstract away).
Or if the AP tried to do the same as the driver did (and I doubt it would consider driving on grass to avoid) and then you get the same collision... Most likely everybody would be sueing Tesla for the outcome of the accident... Is it really their responsibility / decision to make?

I mean, knowing the complete and final trajectory of the other car it's so easy to claim that the solution was obvious and should have been the exact opposite of what AP/FSD tried to do and so, it was all Tesla's fault as the driver would have obviously made the right choice and avoided the collision. But this is all based on assumptions embedded into evasive maneuver - what will the other driver do? This is 50/50. Do you want to die knowing that AP/FSD made the wrong choice or knowing that you did it yourself?

 

[Az_Rael]

I am guessing AP would have braked earlier and would not have left the pavement. Now, that would have reduced the velocity on at least one side of the equation (maybe even coming almost to a stop), but the impact zone would have been the offset frontal most likely. Since the other guy didn't look up until the very last second, he wouldn't have been braking hardly at all. Dunno if that outcome would have been the same or not.

I will say that if HE had even a basic lane departure warning, none of this would have happened. I have a RAV 4 rental right now with lane depature beeps and radar cruise control (it even has auto high beams - very fancy). So this technology is percolating into the market.

That is the real solution: more and more cars with these systems making everyone safer. I know the TACC on my husband's car has caught several big slowdowns in traffic before I did, making for fewer panic stops on my part.

 

[Moderatefan]

That is the real solution: more and more cars with these systems making everyone safer

This is definitely the goal. However, it is costing extra money that some people may be unwilling/unable to spend it if it remains an option and not a law. While we have some of these more dangerous cars/drivers on the road there is always an outstanding dilemma - do you want to trust the system to make the best/lowest risk decision for you and, maybe, die as part of the 10% worst outcome of this scenario or you prefer to think you are a better judge and can avoid the 10% and remain alive. I'm thinking at some point we'll be forced to adopt the risk calculation that comes with the system. I believe Musk's idea was to remove the steering wheel from the car alltogether, it's just at this point FSD is not yet ready and it probably would have been too big of a shoker for most to start the adoption of it even if it was available. So, we need to take smaller steps to complete this transition.

 

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

Wow


Glad you're okay but I'm really saying Wow because just by watching that, in my opinion, that could have been avoided, I would have went left.

Wow really? Maybe if there was no shoulder, but not a good idea to head for the cars trajectory if they correct their mistake. I think it was the perfect maneuver.

 

[keydiver]

If I had swerved left, and he had corrected back to his lane (again, normal driver behavior), we would have hit head on. A very risky move on my part.

Yes, and the police would have placed you at fault for causing the accident because you were in his lane. This happened to a friend of mine. A drunk driver was coming head-on with her, so she swerved into the left lane. He saw he was in the wrong lane and corrected at the last moment, and they hit. Insurance and the police blamed her for being in the wrong lane.

 

[voip-ninja]

The thing that a human driver can do that an AI will have a hard time doing is making a split second decision between two bad choices and trying to weigh the outcome based on things that an AI currently has little to no understanding of.

A human driver, for example, might make the decision to hit another car if the only other option is to swerve out of their lane and injure or maim pedestrians.... you are about to crash and the only options are to hit a minivan that has young children or swerve and hit a bus full of even more children.

These are the kinds of things that worry me about the eventual arrival of FSD.

 

[Petra]

A human driver, for example, might make the decision to hit another car if the only other option is to swerve out of their lane and injure or maim pedestrians.... you are about to crash and the only options are to hit a minivan that has young children or swerve and hit a bus full of even more children.

These are the kinds of things that worry me about the eventual arrival of FSD.

You're over thinking this... The simplest approach is just not to hit things:

1) Don't hit things
2) Don't drive in a manner which reduces the system's ability to not hit things (e.g. staying beside other vehicles, out driving sensor range/response, not keeping appropriate following distance, etc.)
3) If a situation is encountered which defeats core defensive driving, see #1
3a) If no escape route exists which satisfies #1, brake as quickly and hard as possible to minimize the kinetic energy of a collision.

An autonomous system will be able to assess the situation and react much faster than a human... so, even if the solution reached is just to burn off energy, you'd still end up with a much lower energy collision than a human driver.