Who fell 'asleep?'
 

A Tesla S and driver rear-ended a parked firetruck in Culver City CA and the driver claimed that the car was in its semi-autonomous Autopilot mode before it crashed. It was a significant impact and the Model S was totaled. There was no injuries from the driver or fire fighters, that required any medical assistance. The California Highway Patrol and Culver City Fire Department confirmed a Tesla hit a fire truck, but neither could say whether the vehicle had been on Autopilot. The fire truck Engine #42 was situated in the left emergency lane, providing assistance and blocking the scene of a previous accident, when the Tesla S crash occurred.

A Tesla spokesperson says company’s official line on Autopilot, “Autopilot is intended for use only with a fully attentive driver,” it provides active driving assistance features; adaptive cruise control and Autosteer - which keeps the car driving within a lane. No reports if the car slowed down before the crash. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board is now gathering formal details or any recorded telemetry data about this accident.

https://twitter.com/CC_Firefighters/...560192/photo/1

These news stories are only going to get more and more frequent as OEMs start implementing autonomous features. If people have a scapegoat, they'll generally use it, even if its as ridiculous as saying 'I didn't see the gigantic red fire truck'.

Well we already had a tesla not see a tractor trailer pull out in front of it, turning the car into a convertible.
Otherwise I would say the guy is a liar.

Can't wait to see what Tesla finds out in this investigation. They will know what mode the car was in when it impacted the truck. My guess is the driver was confused as to what mode it was in, or merely using it as an excuse to shift blame. Lame excuse though because it doesn't shift blame at all.

Perhaps the software can be acquitted on grounds of insanity.

On a different subject, I wonder how feasible it is to install exterior "airbags" on emergency response vehicles? It seems these are hit fairly frequently, and if they had some sort of detector that senses an impending impact, could inflate a massive airbag designed to dissipate the energy from the crash. Would have to be a heck of a strong material, but should help significantly.

Gotta admit, I loled on that one. :D

I saw the story an hour ago and said "I'll bet there's already a thread on EM." :)

How did an attentive driver get into the emergency lane?

We have these in Sweden. Not an airbag per se, but a giant crumple zone:
http://varningsljusteknik.se/assets/...ss_899x561.jpg

I do not know that term, but we have something like that here, although it is a big accordion. I do not have any idea what it is called and all of the search terms show normal accordions.