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Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

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Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The biggest thing I noticed was just how easily SUV's flip over. This has been a problem forever I'm just surprised that regulators don't take more notice of it. Rollovers are far more likely to result in injury or death. Most cars just don't flip, all the traction their tires have is simply not enough to do it on flat ground. Yeah anything could flip over once you go off the road but the SUV in this looks like a rol…

Because people think these SUVs are "safer" due to their size. And then it becomes an arms race; you see the highway full of large SUVs, and you feel vulnerable in a tiny compact car, because you think they will crush you in a collision, so others start buying SUVs to "protect" themselves. These land-beasts might be comfortable but they are unsafe, take an excess and unfair amount of space on the road, consume too mu…

Yes. IMHO insurance costs should have to figure in the externalities to society of their increased risk to other vehicles on the road, even when the SUV driver isn't at fault. Crashes will happen, but even when the root cause is another vehicle, an SUV in the mix increases the likelihood of a crash due to worse braking distance and increases the severity of the damage to other vehicles due to its mass. SUVs make the road measurably worse for all other users of the road due to their negative externalities.

This is one of the reasons I ride bicycles and motorcycles. I take on more personal risk, but the overall effect is a reduction in accident, injury, and mortality rates for road use.

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the consequences of this would be too significant for Tesla to silently implement. Given an unavoidable rear crash, it could cause a multi-car accident and increase the collision's severity relative to braking.

I was discussing the case of an avoidable rear crash. Vehicle approaching from rear, either not beginning to slow by a minimum expected distance, or slowing, but with apparently insufficient space to come to a stop. Space in front, allowing for safe acceleration. Seems logical to move out of the way, and I don't see any reason why it would increase the chances of a multi-car accident.

Can a Tesla reliably detect a body lying in the road? I think they would be very reluctant to avoid a highly survivable accident where the Tesla is not at fault, in favor of accelerating toward a crash site.

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#344
post #50

Here is a video by Bjørn Nyland demonstrating the ability of the Tesla radar to detect the motion of the car in front of the car you are following: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cG3Jp5GyPoc It shows, how the radar detects, that the lead car breaks first - watch how it gets highlighted in the dashboard. This ability helped the Tesla to handle this accident event.

Cool video. I guess while self driving cars may have inferior analysis to humans for a while they may outperform through better sensors like the radar here.

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#345
post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SUV was pushed into the crash barrier and small car wasn't, so it's a highly unfair comparison. We did a lot of safety research before buying our current round of cars, and you need to not generalize about cars based on classifications like "SUV". Look at actual data from actual cars on actual roads, e.g. http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/driver-death-rates Note that you can find vehicles like the Honda Pilot that…

> What's horribly unsafe to everyone is passenger cars built on truck frames. Have any examples? The vast majority of new SUVs (which the one in this incident appears to be) are unibody rather than body-on-frame ("truck frame" style).

Other than the Jeep Wrangler, few car-size vehicles are still built on truck frames. About 10% of SUVs still are, mostly the larger ones.

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#346
post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does your source account for number of miles driven per capita?

In road fatalities per bn-vehicle-km[1], UK is second, while US is 17th. [1]: http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/transport/road-safety-annual-re... We get road fatalities per person and per vehicle from[2] [2]: http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/road_safety_st... If we take them together: i name p÷v *v/km ------------------------------------ 1 Israel 0.371134 1.96701 2 United Kingdom 0.5686275 2.047059 3 Sweden…

As a Brit, though it would be nice to think we drive better, I think most of the effect is down to road engineering. Roundabouts have lower fatalities than traffic lights for example.

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My mom got in an accident due to driving too close to the car in front of her. It caused me to really take heart to my Driver's Ed teachers word of wisdom to always leave enough space in front of you to be able to safely brake to prevent that. I wish everyone would do that. It also makes driving in traffic less stop-and-go

yeah i try to do that but then other cars just merge in between the space i leave in front of me and force me to be on their tail. meanwhile the guy behind me never leaves enough distance either. safe driving doesn't mean anything when others drive recklessly

When people behind don't respect the safety distance (and, for me, 1s is my level of tolerance), I switch on my warning lights. I keep them on for 20km if necessary. I know it's illegal, but if that's what it takes to make others respect my safety distance, I think it's worth it. And it's better than other (bad) solutions like hitting the brakes to test the guy's safety distance...

We should just be allowed to carry police-verified dash cams which issues fines in live ;)

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely the problem. Safe follow distance isn't an evolutionarily-stable strategy. The number of accidents avoided by people following it is more than offset (at least psychologically in the minds of the drivers) by the perception that people are constantly cutting you off if you adhere to it. Since punishments for failing to adhere to it are few and far between, drivers get sloppy. It's the sort of thing you could…

> It's the sort of thing you could, however, program into a robot and expect the robot to adhere to it. I've often wondered what people will initially do when being driven around by a robot. How anxious will it make them feel, not to give up control, but to see a robot driving "so slowly". Not going 10 over, letting other drivers in when possible, always slowing to keep a safe distance, not passing aggressively if so…

The latest OS upgrade of the Tesla prevents the autopilot from going faster than the speed limit. I wonder what owners think about that.

Re: Tesla footage of braking before crash ahead [video]

#350
post #346
post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In road fatalities per bn-vehicle-km[1], UK is second, while US is 17th. [1]: http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/transport/road-safety-annual-re... We get road fatalities per person and per vehicle from[2] [2]: http://www.who.int/violence_injury_prevention/road_safety_st... If we take them together: i name p÷v *v/km ------------------------------------ 1 Israel 0.371134 1.96701 2 United Kingdom 0.5686275 2.047059 3 Sweden…

As a Brit, though it would be nice to think we drive better, I think most of the effect is down to road engineering. Roundabouts have lower fatalities than traffic lights for example.

That's because you have that British self-deprecation thing.

However, because I'm not British, I have no problem saying this:

You guys know how to drive, but if it makes you feel better, the Swedes are better.

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