Needsdecaf
Active Member
You're quibbling.
But your point is valid. This is what happens when people do ZERO fact checking before hitting "publish".
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[UPDATED] 2 die in Tesla crash - NHTSA reports driver seat occupied
- Thread starter diplomat33
- Start date
You're quibbling.
But your point is valid. This is what happens when people do ZERO fact checking before hitting "publish".
Ed Hart
Member
Another poster said the car owner was in the passenger seat, and his home was just a few hundred yards from where the accident took place. I placed a pin at the published site.
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Soda Popinski
Member
To me, "co-pilot" is worse, as a co-pilot is capable of fully operating a vehicle when the pilot goes to eat, sleep or go to the bathroom. Autopilot (both in a plane and Teslas) require the vehicle operator to be at the controls.
1. Has it been mentioned anywhere if they immediately crashed after getting in the car or perhaps drove up and down the streets a few times? Maybe drove down then up Hammock Dunes Place, around the cul de sac and then crashed.
2. If, on the extremely remote chance they somehow did engage TACC and Autosteer on their way UP Hammock Dunes Place from Thornblade Circle, is there any combination of luck, speed control adjusting, following a lead car, or jiggering that could let the car steer itself around the cul de sac and then back down Hammock Dunes Place?
3. Does manually pressing the accelerator disengage Autosteer, assuming you have got it to engage on a street? If not, then can you keep manually accelerating to a speed at which Autosteer can no longer keep you on the road and you crash?
2. If, on the extremely remote chance they somehow did engage TACC and Autosteer on their way UP Hammock Dunes Place from Thornblade Circle, is there any combination of luck, speed control adjusting, following a lead car, or jiggering that could let the car steer itself around the cul de sac and then back down Hammock Dunes Place?
3. Does manually pressing the accelerator disengage Autosteer, assuming you have got it to engage on a street? If not, then can you keep manually accelerating to a speed at which Autosteer can no longer keep you on the road and you crash?
SomeJoe7777
Marginally-Known Member
The position of the rear seat occupant is a little odd, for sure. However, there are scenarios that would adequately explain it.
If he was the driver and crawled to the rear seat seeking escape, what escape methods would he have likely tried?
- Open rear doors with electric push button. This may have failed due to 12V failure, physically jammed doors because of the impact, or child-protection locks turned on.
- Open the rear doors with the mechanical release. This may not have been tried at all, as it's difficult to remember during an emergency situation. Further, if the doors were physically jammed due to impact, the mechanical release wouldn't have worked here.
- Lay on your back on the rear seat and attempt to kick out the window or kick open the doors. He may have tried this and failed, or perhaps he couldn't try this because he was injured. The vehicle hit a tree causing enough damage underneath and to the front of the car to damage the battery pack significantly enough to start a fire. It's logical to assume there may have been damage to the driver and passenger footwell areas. If that's the case, the driver may have had a broken ankle or broken leg, precluding the possibility of using a kick-out method. This would also have delayed his move to the rear seat, reducing the time he had to escape. Given Tesla's mention of the deformed steering wheel, some type of injury to the driver is likely, though no one can say for sure if the injury would have interfered with his escape attempts.
- Sit in the seat and attempt to force the door using strikes with your shoulder. If he was injured and could not attempt #3, this would be the next likely attempted method, and would account for his seated position.
- Attempt to fold down the rear seats and get into the rear cargo area. To do this would require turning around to face the rear of the car while bent over and standing/crouching on the rear floorboard or kneeling on the rear seat. Injury may have prevented this attempt, or he may not have had enough time to get to this method. Even if this method was successful, exiting from the rear cargo area would be as difficult or more so than exiting from the passenger area.
Feeling the need to clarify with correct info. The passenger in the rear, not passenger seat, was the car’s owner and presumably the driver here. That other poster was mistaken or simply incorrect about his seat location in the car. The two men’s identities and addresses are listed in the Fire Marshall’s report that just came out today. The car owner’s home was located around the cul de sac, the front seat passenger was a resident of Spring as well but his residence was on a different street.
From my understanding of air bags and belts, including the child-protection weight-sensor issue, I think it's very unlikely that the airbag deployment would be suppressed.
1. Three-point shoulder belts remain the single most effective and important tool in protecting the driver and front passenger. The original and still most basic reason for development (and later, mandated standard inclusion) of front airbags was that too many people were not being convinced to use shoulder belts in the 1970s through 1990s. This despite various ad campaigns and failed attempts to facilitate and/or force their use via clever auto-harnessing mechanisms, reminder lights & buzzers, and starter interlocks. Over time, the public has largely accepted them
2. In the absence of shoulder belts, the front airbag becomes hugely important as the primary life-saver and injury mitigator in the most commonly fatal front collisions. (Advanced multi-airbag systems, seat mounts, pre-tensioners and other features are notable but beyond the scope of this post.) I'd be extremely surprised and dismayed to be told that an unbuckled belt would de-activate the airbag deployment, for an occupied passenger seat or for the driver seat at all - which should never be unoccupied short of future L4/L5 scenarios! An unbuckled driver is exactly the most pertinent scenario needing airbag protection.
3. OTOH it is true that the energy of the airbag deployment, a very violent and itself somewhat dangerous event, may be adjusted downwards for children and lighter-weight passengers, and possibly also for small, lighter-weight adult drivers. This refinement occurred, I think, 10 to 20 years ago following some injuries and deaths blamed on the airbag deployment itself. But again I don't see a sensible justification for complete de-activation on the driver side especially with an unbuckled belt.
I don't really love airbags myself, I love shoulder belts and intelligent crash-mitigation engineering of all kinds. I'm somewhat nervous when working around the dash in an airbag car. But truthfully airbag systems are getting a lot better lately.
SomeJoe7777
Marginally-Known Member
By the way, one of the questions to be answered in the investigation that has been tossed around here is the status of the seat belts at the time of the crash. Were they buckled or not, and which ones?
According to the latest public information, no seat belts were found fastened post-crash. However, because post-crash movement of the occupants is possible in this case, this does not tell us about the seat belt status at the moment of the crash.
But, the investigators should be able to look at the seat belt pre-tensioners to determine which seat belts were in use at the time of the crash. If you're not familiar with them, seat belt pre-tensioners are small pyro devices that tighten the seat belt against the occupant during a crash. They're triggered to fire along with airbags, and if I remember correctly, should fire only when the belt is buckled or seat is occupied, similar to how airbags are triggered. (I'm not sure this is true for every vehicle, but the idea is since both airbags and seat belt pretensioners are single-use devices and expensive to replace, it's not economical to fire them unless needed).
See the slow-motion video here:
According to the latest public information, no seat belts were found fastened post-crash. However, because post-crash movement of the occupants is possible in this case, this does not tell us about the seat belt status at the moment of the crash.
But, the investigators should be able to look at the seat belt pre-tensioners to determine which seat belts were in use at the time of the crash. If you're not familiar with them, seat belt pre-tensioners are small pyro devices that tighten the seat belt against the occupant during a crash. They're triggered to fire along with airbags, and if I remember correctly, should fire only when the belt is buckled or seat is occupied, similar to how airbags are triggered. (I'm not sure this is true for every vehicle, but the idea is since both airbags and seat belt pretensioners are single-use devices and expensive to replace, it's not economical to fire them unless needed).
See the slow-motion video here:
The problem is that the fire was probably hot enough to trigger all of the airbags and seat belt pre-tensioners....
Or just melt everything into a puddle. The pillars of the car were found melted.
I think in a moment like that: it would be difficult to think about climbing into the trunk to get out. Unless you do a drill on it or play it in your head multiple times, it might be difficult to even think about it during time of distress. A better option would be having something like a "Resqme" key chain window breaker in the car at all times. But again: would have to be able to get it and use it when the time comes.
Silicon Desert
Well-Known Member
I guess it is possible but in most of those systems there is a bit of hysteresis built into the systems to account for that. In other words, air bag designers thought of that long ago.
As I wrote in my reply earlier today, I don't readily accept the premise that the driver's airbag would be programmed to completely de-activate in any forward-driving state of the car, especially not if the belt is unbuckled. That would defeat the very most important need case for the airbag.
Perhaps reduced deployment energy to protect a smaller driver, but not turned off.
Watts_Up
Well-Known Member
May be the driver pressed the wrong pedal just before the curve?
Or was not looking at the road, as he was distracted talking with the passenger?
This remind the limo in fire with 5 people trapped inside, trying to escape using the front door.
I think the fire occurred because the air balloon of the rear suspension failed, and the tires were rubbing against the body of the car.
Everything surely went very fast, but I was surprised that no one outside, including the driver, tried to break a side window?
Also I suspect that the ladies attending the wedding might have been wearing high heel shoes, which could have been used to break a window?
Limo fire survivor recalls escape from blaze that killed her 5 friends
Or was not looking at the road, as he was distracted talking with the passenger?
This remind the limo in fire with 5 people trapped inside, trying to escape using the front door.
I think the fire occurred because the air balloon of the rear suspension failed, and the tires were rubbing against the body of the car.
Everything surely went very fast, but I was surprised that no one outside, including the driver, tried to break a side window?
Also I suspect that the ladies attending the wedding might have been wearing high heel shoes, which could have been used to break a window?
Limo fire survivor recalls escape from blaze that killed her 5 friends
'I am going to die': Sole survivor of limo fire tells how she squeezed through a tiny gap
to the front seat to escape blaze that killed five of her friends during bachelorette party.
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Needsdecaf
Active Member
1. Either way, they were traveling westbound from the cul de sac. So there was less than 400' from the time they either started or executed a 180 degree, sub-15 MPH turn.
2. This is impossible for several reasons. Autosteer WILL NOT ACTIVATE on these roads. Period. Second, for that to happen, the car would have had to have FSD beta. I think even if the car would have had autosteer working, there's no way it would have negotiated that cul de sac.
In case you mentioned my earlier postings, I live in the next neighborhood over, and I've been through this developement. The construction of the roads there is identical to the ones that I drive every day. Autopilot (on a Model 3 with either HW 2.5 or 3.0) will NOT engage Autosteer on these roads. Period.
3. No, manually pressing the accelerator does not disengage autosteer.
BrianBigNFun
Giver of snark
wow, so most likely scenario now becomes that the driver was thrown into the back during the crash and both remained unconscious
Altho I suppose there is a chance the driver roused after the fire and tried crawling in the back
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It does when you get to 90 mph, witch only takes a second or two in a P100DL car.
A frontal impact won't throw the driver into the back.
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