Highway oopsie!

[hobbit]

I passed a pair of vehicles stopped on the shoulder of a local highway today. A tesla [S I think] had
just rear-ended a pickup truck. Bent up the hood and nose a bit, didn't look structural but who's to
say on a brief glance.

But I thought Teslas has all kinds of anti-collision stuff to prevent that?? Not today, or this driver
outwitted the idiot-proofing.

_H*

 

[bwilson4web]

Teslas has multiple safety systems that can be tailored to the driver's preference:
https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport

While no car can prevent all accidents, we work every day to try to make them much less likely to occur.
. . .
Q4 2022

In the 4th quarter, we recorded one crash for every 4.85 million miles driven in which drivers were using Autopilot technology. For drivers who were not using Autopilot technology, we recorded one crash for every 1.40 million miles driven. By comparison, the most recent data available from NHTSA and FHWA (from 2021) shows that in the United States there was an automobile crash approximately every 652,000 miles.​

As for that particular accident, every Tesla has a built-in, dash cam recording system. Also part of the security monitor, it covers at least four of the eight, external cameras. Then the ABS system records the seconds before air bag deployment. It will be a well documented accident.

My preference is:

• manual on most, multilane left turns, right turns are OK
• manual in areas with poor or incomplete mapping
• autopilot and/or full self driving at all other times

Bob Wilson

​

 

[bwilson4web]

Sorry, the edit window closed. There are other reports: https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradte...-story-with-their-crash-data/?sh=3b9a35c1feda

Their raw numbers do seem very good, but the reality is disturbingly different.

• 0.18 Airbag deployments per million miles with Autopilot engaged (almost entirely on freeways)
• 0.31 Airbag deployments per million non-highway miles with FSD prototype engaged
• 0.68 Airbag deployments per million general miles in those few Teslas which disable the active safety systems such as collision warning and avoidance.
• 1.53 Police reported crashes per million miles for all cars, both with and without airbags deployment, as reported by NHTSA.

Source_2: https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a44185487/report-tesla-autopilot-crashes-since-2019/

Tesla's Autopilot software has been involved with more deaths and injuries than previously known: a total of 17 fatalities and 736 crashes since 2019, according to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) analyzed by the Washington Post.​

Source_3: https://dawnproject.com/dan-odowd-i...ects-safety-tests-of-tesla-full-self-driving/

John Koetsier: Elon Musk calls him “batshit crazy,” but Dan O’Dowd has built software for . . . and completed a ton of test drives of Tesla full self driving.

His conclusion: it’s worse than a drunk driver.

And: it does not recognize small children, leading to situations where it could cheerfully run them right over. (It does appear to recognize adults.)

In this TechFirst we chat with Dan about his tests, what he thinks is wrong with Tesla, and why Tesla is falling behind General Motors and Google (Waymo) in full self driving.
. . .​

Bob Wilson