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NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

arstechnica.com

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Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#61

Post by baconmania »

Animats wrote: post #42

NTSB: • At 8 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was following a lead vehicle and was traveling about 65 mph. • At 7 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla began a left steering movement while following a lead vehicle. • At 4 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was no longer following a lead vehicle. • At 3 seconds prior to the crash and up to the time of impact with the crash attenuator, the Tesla’s speed increas…

What's your source for the claim that Tesla's system "doesn't detect stationary objects"? From the reference frame of a moving Tesla, both globally stationary and globally moving objects will appear to be in motion.

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#62

Post by MBCook »

Someone1234 wrote: post #55
ingenieroariel wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This happens with regular adaptive cruise control on my Ford, when the cruise control set point is a lot higher than the current speed: the car accelerates after another car clears the lane and ram into things.

To contrast that anecdote, this doesn't happen with my Subaru with EyeSight. It uses parallax for 3D distance, if it detects a solid object ahead (be it vehicle, wall, barrier, or anything else) it will apply the emergency braking system (which may still result in a collision in the given circumstances but at much less fatal speeds). The industry has many highly effective AEB systems, and has for years now. I cannot…

I think the parent was talking about in the general case, when there are no obstacles.

I imagine the Ford would brake too if it detected an obsticle (and has an AEB system of some sort).

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#63

Post by cornholio »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #37
martin_bech wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A counter argument that HUMAN DRIVERS are unsafe an fatal (let alone missing common sense and alertness). I 100% get your point, but my counterpoint, is that this is what we are going to see, in the future. Autonomous systems that by and large are way safer, than human drivers, but when they fail, the might do so, in circumstances where are human would not. Humans are good at some things, computers/ai/sensor suites a…

It is not clear that this particular autonomous driving system is better than a human driver.

This is not even an autonomous driving system. Let loose to drive from city A to city B without human supervision, it will crash 9/10 trips.

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#64

Post by jungturk »

beenBoutIT wrote: post #38

Anyone here actually think Elon uses autopilot?

Not sure about Elon, but I suspect (hope?) most of us Tesla drivers have familiarized themselves with the limitations of the system.

Its got a couple scenarios in my experience where it shines - chiefly long drives on clean clear interstates and stop-and-go traffic - but its got suicidal tendencies in others.

Its not unlike being driven by a tipsy friend or a teenager - there are enough indications that it can't be trusted.

Unlike those situations, its easy enough to take control back once you realize that.

Marketing it above its capabilities surely isn't helping, though.

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#65

Post by d0lph »

ebikelaw wrote: post #23
ckastner wrote: post #12

> His hands were not detected on the steering wheel for the final six seconds prior to the crash. > Tesla has said that Huang received warnings to put his hands on the wheel, but according to the NTSB, these warnings came more than 15 minutes before the crash. > Tesla has emphasized that a damaged crash attenuator had contributed to the severity of the crash. These may or may not have been factors contributing to the…

The deficiency of Tesla AP has been abundantly clear to anyone with eyes, for a long time. Only fingers-in-ears Musk fans cannot see that.

Or perhaps us fingers-in-ears Musk fans don't expect the AP to be perfect. Especially considering how new the fields are.

Autopilot doesn't need to be perfect, just better than humans.

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#66

Post by [deleted] »

ckastner wrote: post #59
Animats wrote: post #42

NTSB: • At 8 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was following a lead vehicle and was traveling about 65 mph. • At 7 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla began a left steering movement while following a lead vehicle. • At 4 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was no longer following a lead vehicle. • At 3 seconds prior to the crash and up to the time of impact with the crash attenuator, the Tesla’s speed increas…

> This is the Tesla self-crashing car in action. Remember how it works. It visually recognizes rear ends of cars using a BW camera I'm sure Tesla's engineers are qualified and it is certainly easy to second-guess them, but it is beyond me why they would even consider a BW camera in a context where warning colors (red signs, red cones, black and yellow stripes, etc.) are an essential element of the domain.

[deleted]

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#67

Post by ocdtrekkie »

Animats wrote: post #42

NTSB: • At 8 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was following a lead vehicle and was traveling about 65 mph. • At 7 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla began a left steering movement while following a lead vehicle. • At 4 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was no longer following a lead vehicle. • At 3 seconds prior to the crash and up to the time of impact with the crash attenuator, the Tesla’s speed increas…

Before it even entered the gore area, it likely centered between the actual lane of the highway and the exit lane. Bear in mind, when a lane forks, there is a time the lane is wider than average. And with the gore area lines worn, the car may have missed it entirely. Once it was centered to the gore area, presumably it didn't consider the lines under or directly in front of the car to be lane lines.

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#68

Post by Someone1234 »

unethical_ban wrote: post #11
netsharc wrote: post #8

Dear Elon, want to start a website that rates how fake-newsy government-produced accident reports are? /S "FDA said my farm is producing salmonella-infected chicken. Downvote their report on this URL!"

Without commenting on the rest of the issues with Musk/Tesla, his tweet about a news verification agency was a joke. Verifiably. It was nicknamed Pravda, and a corporation related to his tweet was registered to Musk on Oct 17 2017, the anniversery of the October Revolution.

> was a joke. Verifiably.

Can you link to what verified that?

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#69

Post by agumonkey »

Animats wrote: post #42

NTSB: • At 8 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was following a lead vehicle and was traveling about 65 mph. • At 7 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla began a left steering movement while following a lead vehicle. • At 4 seconds prior to the crash, the Tesla was no longer following a lead vehicle. • At 3 seconds prior to the crash and up to the time of impact with the crash attenuator, the Tesla’s speed increas…

I don't get it, the system relies on two kinds of sensors ? radars for rear-ends and optical cameras for broader decision making ? so that location confused the cameras and that was it ? the car has no ability to understand its surrounding outside crude parsing of the visual field (trained ML I suppose)...

that's quite fucked up.

Re: NTSB: Autopilot steered Tesla car toward traffic barrier before deadly crash

#70

Post by MBCook »

So people are asking why the barrier wasn’t detected, and that’s fair.

Here’s another question: why wasn’t the ‘gore’ zone detected?

Why did the car thing it was safe to drive over and area with striped white lines covering the pavement?

It saw the white line on the side of that area and decided that was a land market but ignored the striped area you’re not supposed to drive on?

If you’re reading the lines on the pavement you have to try to look at all of them.

I don’t know if other cars, like those with MobileEye systems, do that but given Tesla’s safety claims they’d better be trying.

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