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An Update on Last Week’s Accident

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Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#111

Post by xapata »

na85 wrote: post #55
lopmotr wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like peering into the black box of autopilot and anthropomorphising some parts of it but not others. Why not say "autopilot sometimes drives into barriers and also humans sometimes drive into barriers."? In both cases the driver/autopilot failed for whatever reason.

That's disingenuous. The only reason a human drives into that barrier is if they swerve to avoid something or are otherwise not properly paying attention (texting, etc.). There's no good reason for the autopilot to have hit that barrier. The mental gymnastics going on in these comments attempting to absolve Tesla of any responsibility are truly next-level.

A swerve is not the only possibility, as the area between lanes looks like a lane. My father has done the same thing while driving at night. He insisted he was in a lane while I yelled repeatedly that he wasn't. Luckily he changed lanes / entered a real lane just before we crashed.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#112

Post by xapata »

incadenza wrote: post #30
loeg wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Fully aware" drivers (true Scotsmen) as proposed here statistically do not exist, or at least do not compose the vast majority of drivers. So it is kind of a meaningless comparison to draw.

It's not a True Scotsman in this context. The point is that humans tend to crash into things they're not fully aware of, short of self-harm. Either: A) The autopilot could not see a concrete barrier in its path. B) More likely, and as the story reports, it WAS aware of the danger but didn't do anything. Either case is at least worth discussing, no?

In which bucket would you put the possibility that the computer observed evidence of the barrier, but the evidence that there was no barrier -- the prior that barriers don't exist in lanes of traffic -- was too strong?

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#113

Post by Cshelton »

sp332 wrote: post #35
hcnews wrote: post #7

> In the moments before the collision, which occurred at 9:27 a.m. on Friday, March 23rd, Autopilot was engaged with the adaptive cruise control follow-distance set to minimum. Would've loved to know the exact moments we are talking about here. Is it 5 seconds or 5 minutes? > The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive and the driver’s hands were not detected on the wh…

If you ignore it long enough, the autopilot will disengage entirely. The car will drive in a straight line and coast to a stop.

As a Tesla owner, this is not accurate wording. The car will very quickly decelerate until about 5 mph if you have the crawl feature on.

I need to make a post, as a long time Tesla owner/very frequent autopilot user, because I think I know exactly what happened. Unfortunately I need to go to bed, already up later that I should be for tomorrow. A lot of information and comments I’ve seen about how it works and how autopilot is dangerous etc, are quite wrong. I think it’d be important for people to understand how it works from people who use it and get their opinions first before making statements about AP in general.

For the record, I love using AP and will continue to do so. But it is no silver bullet, and 99.5% of Tesla owners know this and how to correctly use it.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#114

Post by evincarofautumn »

mozumder wrote: post #104
NotSammyHagar wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This does not mean their autopilot is not dangerous. It also doesn't mean that it is dangerous. That bag of doritos that you ate, it might also be dangerous. Let's use facts and not vague worrisome complaints. So if you want to talk about the higher danger of rural roads, please give a number, and then give a number for tesla, or estimate one. Don't just say "urgh".

I mean, if Tesla is comparing their luxury car's death rates to motorcycles, which have 10x-50x the fatality rate of passenger cars, then, yes, it's dangerous. Remember, there are several very normal cars models that have had ZERO deaths: https://www.nbcnews.com/business/autos/record-9-models-have-... These autopilot cars are death traps.

I wonder if it’s possible to determine whether those cars have zero death rates in part because someone who would buy that model is less likely to get in a fatal accident in the first place—whether because of who they are, or how they were advertised, or whatever. I imagine a minivan owner as a very cautious driver…then again, I have been in the passenger seat when a friend was doing drifts in his mom’s minivan, so your mileage may vary.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#115

Post by mozumder »

evincarofautumn wrote: post #114
mozumder wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, if Tesla is comparing their luxury car's death rates to motorcycles, which have 10x-50x the fatality rate of passenger cars, then, yes, it's dangerous. Remember, there are several very normal cars models that have had ZERO deaths: https://www.nbcnews.com/business/autos/record-9-models-have-... These autopilot cars are death traps.

I wonder if it’s possible to determine whether those cars have zero death rates in part because someone who would buy that model is less likely to get in a fatal accident in the first place—whether because of who they are, or how they were advertised, or whatever. I imagine a minivan owner as a very cautious driver…then again, I have been in the passenger seat when a friend was doing drifts in his mom’s minivan, so y…

I've had 2 of those cars - the Sorento and the Odyssey, and they both feel really tactile/agile to drive, as well as being chill, relaxing rides.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#116

Post by eckza »

7dare wrote: post #92
Robotbeat wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the answer is that the path into the barrier looks just like an actual lane, and that this was enough confusion that a human driver apparently had made the same exact mistake a week earlier. https://imgur.com/a/iMY1x https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/screen-sho...

The lanes aren't very well indicated, but given how visible the divider is, I don't think either an autopilot or a driver should drive off. Reminds me of a scene in "La grande vadrouille" where a motorcyclist is killed on a mountain road because he was following the dotted line and the painter had gone to the side of the road to take a break. Also, that's an immense pothole!

> That’s an immense pothole!

... well you certainly aren’t from southeast Michigan, that’s for sure.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#117

Post by agumonkey »

sp332 wrote: post #41
tuna-piano wrote: post #37

Their statement blames: -The driver -The crushed barrier -Statistics But they do not take responsibility themselves. It's apparent and in my opinion shameful. If Tesla's goal of this is to just share the facts, why didn't they state what AutoPilot did? In addition to statements like "...the driver’s hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision.", wouldn't it make sense to have a stateme…

It was a median in the middle of the highway. The car probably continued in a straight line instead of "steering into" a barrier. https://imgur.com/a/iMY1x

Not excusing tesla but how on earth can there be a piece of flat concrete instead of a v shaped bendable deflector ? Was there one but had to be replaced ?

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#118

Post by colordrops »

andrewstuart2 wrote: post #5

Really not much additional info here aside from the number of warnings the driver had. Also, the standard "Tesla is 10x safer" metrics that get pulled out each time a crash gets sensationalized. What I think they fail to address, especially in this case, is that the autopilot did something a human driver who was paying attention would never do. Autopilot does a great job of saving people from things even a wary drive…

But this wasn't a self driving vehicle. It isn't capable of dealing with all situations, and it warning the driver for 6 seconds to take control, which didn't happen.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#119

Post by voxadam »

praptak wrote: post #110
Robotbeat wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the answer is that the path into the barrier looks just like an actual lane, and that this was enough confusion that a human driver apparently had made the same exact mistake a week earlier. https://imgur.com/a/iMY1x https://techcrunch.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/screen-sho...

This divider looks rather unforgiving. Is it common for dividers in US to be just plain concrete blocks without anything to prevent rapid deceleration?

If you look at the imgur link you'll see a impact barrier that had previously been crushed and not reset or repaired.

Re: An Update on Last Week’s Accident

#120

Post by Ardren »

Maro wrote: post #73
Tempest1981 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is the confusing sentence: (dots added) "The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive ... and the driver’s hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision." https://www.tesla.com/blog/update-last-week’s-accident

It's not clear to me whether the "several visual and one audible hands-on" happened right before the crash (6-10 seconds), or the minutes before.

If it was close to the crash they would have straight up just said that. They're just trying to muddy the facts.
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