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A Tragic Loss

teslamotors.com

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Re: A Tragic Loss

#11

Post by jackpirate »

mathattack wrote: post #3

Tragic. Good that they own it, though I'm not thrilled with this: It is important to note that Tesla disables Autopilot by default and requires explicit acknowledgement that the system is new technology and still in a public beta phase before it can be enabled. When drivers activate Autopilot, the acknowledgment box explains, among other things, that Autopilot “is an assist feature that requires you to keep your hand…

This statement is also disengenuous:

This is the first known fatality in just over 130 million miles where Autopilot was activated. Among all vehicles in the US, there is a fatality every 94 million miles. Worldwide, there is a fatality approximately every 60 million miles.

The wording implies that these numbers are directly comparable, but they are not. I would guess that Autopilot is much more likely to be activated in safe situations. But the other statistics include all situtations.

Re: A Tragic Loss

#12

Post by fixermark »

dvcc wrote: post #9
zallarak wrote: post #7

No other auto maker would do this. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but this makes me respect Tesla even more. It's also a reminder to engineers to have an extremely high bar of excellence. EDIT: thanks for telling me I'm wrong. This was a self-serving blog post on their part to damage control.

This was entirely defensive and self-serving on behalf of Tesla. It's a general PR release, companies do these all the time. What made this so special?

the fact that they could.

Imagine how many press releases there'd be per day if another auto company felt compelled to do one for each accident their cars were involved in.

Re: A Tragic Loss

#13

Post by Pxtl »

simonsarris wrote: post #2

> What we know is that the vehicle was on a divided highway with Autopilot engaged when a tractor trailer drove across the highway perpendicular to the Model S. Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied. Tragic no doubt, but I'm relieved that this was not a "Autopilot did something very very wrong" story. Autopilot has the p…

That doesn't sound like what happened. "The driver didn't notice" well, that's why they're using autopilot.

No matter how many messages people throw at users, any autopilot that doesn't detect that the driver is awake and operating the vehicle is going to be used by sleeping or otherwise unattentive drivers. It's just human nature.

So what likely happened was the driver was screwing around and the autopilot completely failed to notice a giant white truck crossing the road and blocking their way until it was too late.

edit: reply is quite right, shouldn't speak ill of the dead that way. "Screwing around" is unfair. I just mean that "driver falls asleep/paying attention to other things" is the expected outcome of any autopilot system, and so it's unreasonable of autopilots to have any expectation of drivers for attentiveness.

Re: A Tragic Loss

#15

Post by dvcc »

simonsarris wrote: post #2

> What we know is that the vehicle was on a divided highway with Autopilot engaged when a tractor trailer drove across the highway perpendicular to the Model S. Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied. Tragic no doubt, but I'm relieved that this was not a "Autopilot did something very very wrong" story. Autopilot has the p…

How would we ever know that the autopilot acted correctly? Should companies be required to release logs after every crash when a car is in autopilot? Seems fair.

Re: A Tragic Loss

#16

Post by petercooper »

Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky,

I'm intrigued that the color is relevant in the car's case - wouldn't it be using some sort of radar to detect and map objects rather than vision? I appreciate I am probably missing something.

Re: A Tragic Loss

#17

Post by fixermark »

return0 wrote: post #8

Tesla should not allow autopilots. They have nothing to gain by the negative publicity they will get from cases like these. Regardless of how bad luck the driver had, tesla can always be blamed for relaxing the driver's reflexes by giving a false sense of safety. It doesnt matter if it was by default turned off or hidden in menus. What other companies use this kind of driving assist system? The ones i know are only h…

What they gain is hours on the road, real-life driving data. That's invaluable for tuning of machine learning systems like this one.

They've also, FWIW, gained quite a bit of positive press. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=tesla+autopilot...

Re: A Tragic Loss

#18

Post by dingo_bat »

mathattack wrote: post #3

Tragic. Good that they own it, though I'm not thrilled with this: It is important to note that Tesla disables Autopilot by default and requires explicit acknowledgement that the system is new technology and still in a public beta phase before it can be enabled. When drivers activate Autopilot, the acknowledgment box explains, among other things, that Autopilot “is an assist feature that requires you to keep your hand…

So how would autopilot turn the wheel if the driver is holding it?

Re: A Tragic Loss

#19

Post by mikeash »

Pxtl wrote: post #13
simonsarris wrote: post #2

> What we know is that the vehicle was on a divided highway with Autopilot engaged when a tractor trailer drove across the highway perpendicular to the Model S. Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied. Tragic no doubt, but I'm relieved that this was not a "Autopilot did something very very wrong" story. Autopilot has the p…

That doesn't sound like what happened. "The driver didn't notice" well, that's why they're using autopilot. No matter how many messages people throw at users, any autopilot that doesn't detect that the driver is awake and operating the vehicle is going to be used by sleeping or otherwise unattentive drivers. It's just human nature. So what likely happened was the driver was screwing around and the autopilot completel…

From the information given, we don't know if the truck pulled out right in front of the car giving the driver no time to react, or if the truck pulled out a minute beforehand and the driver was just oblivious. In the absence of any information either way, it's nasty to just assume the driver was inattentive.

Re: A Tragic Loss

#20

Post by gjulianm »

Pxtl wrote: post #13
simonsarris wrote: post #2

> What we know is that the vehicle was on a divided highway with Autopilot engaged when a tractor trailer drove across the highway perpendicular to the Model S. Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied. Tragic no doubt, but I'm relieved that this was not a "Autopilot did something very very wrong" story. Autopilot has the p…

That doesn't sound like what happened. "The driver didn't notice" well, that's why they're using autopilot. No matter how many messages people throw at users, any autopilot that doesn't detect that the driver is awake and operating the vehicle is going to be used by sleeping or otherwise unattentive drivers. It's just human nature. So what likely happened was the driver was screwing around and the autopilot completel…

From the article, it seems that this autopilot checks that the driver is attentive.

> When drivers activate Autopilot, the acknowledgment box explains, among other things, that Autopilot “is an assist feature that requires you to keep your hands on the steering wheel at all times," and that "you need to maintain control and responsibility for your vehicle” while using it. Additionally, every time that Autopilot is engaged, the car reminds the driver to “Always keep your hands on the wheel. Be prepared to take over at any time.” The system also makes frequent checks to ensure that the driver's hands remain on the wheel and provides visual and audible alerts if hands-on is not detected. It then gradually slows down the car until hands-on is detected again.

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