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.

This is what Montana has behind their trucks this time of year. The towplow! Crumple zones be damned, even the best software can't avoid wanting to crash into this!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkmBP-ISzKk

We have the cheaper version. Not as colorful, not as many lights and tvs and such.

From a picture I saw elsewhere, it looked as though the fire truck was in both the emergency lane and the leftmost travel lane. And who says there was an attentive driver?

We have similar here (though only about 1/3 as long, and just the impact bumper, not the big video screen) but they're on special highway construction/maintenance trucks. Usually there'll be one parked at the beginning of a work zone.

I saw something similar in NY state. Tow-behinds to clear two lanes at the same time. Didn't have anything for salt (bleagh) besides the bed and a spreader.

I'd say this is what happens when you let your marketing guys market autopilot...people will treat it as such.

I'd say this is what happens with any product; people find ways to misuse and hurt themselves. The fact that this is news confirms the problem is rare.

True enough. Fault is hard to find. Tesla's animated marketing joins the average person's lack of time to fully understand what its limits are. But I'd say it's easier to modify Tesla's marketing than to enhance the critical thinking of John or Jane Q. Public, who is likely already grabbing onto this tech as a way to more efficiently use the time they don't have to better understand Tesla autopilot limits.

Maybe the guy had the cruise control on, though it was the automatic drive mode.

I highly doubt the driver was unaware of Tesla's stance on the technology, or who is legally responsible for the safe operation of the vehicle.

If the automated functions were active, which we only have the driver's word so far, I'm certain the driver didn't immediately start out heavily relying on the technology to drive for them. They gradually got comfortable with the reliability and felt comfortable with their level of inattention. The marketing didn't develop this level of trust; it was through personal interaction with the system that confidence was developed.

What part of Tesla's marketing suggests you can take a nap, or pay no attention to the road? I haven't seen this video yet.

I've got no vested interest in Tesla, but the excuses I hear for bad behavior and personal responsibility is alarming. If we start buying into the idea that everyone but the individual is responsible for their actions, society doesn't stand a chance. Risk is always part of progress. Like it or not, we're all part of the human experiment.

Let's be honest. Autopilot is always going to put people to sleep.

Like one comment from a Teslaphile on another forum. "I fell a sleep and the car pulled over, saving my life."

No autopilot put you to sleep endangering everyone's life.

Anyone ever fallen asleep on a motorbike? Didn't think so.

Autopilot doesn't put real pilots to sleep, and flying is way more boring than driving.

Sure, disengaging the mind contributes to sleepiness, but autopilot isn't injecting sleeping gas into the cabin. I managed to make it through my dreadfully boring work day. There are plenty of people who utilize Tesla's autopilot and don't fall asleep, and it has to do with knowing your limits.

The ultimate goal is to create a safe enough autonomous system that someone could fall asleep and expect to arrive at the destination safely. I don't believe we'll see that until cars begin communicating their intentions to the surrounding vehicles, and sending alerts to possible hazards.

:eek:I did drift onto the shoulder once my KLR, the drop off was big enough to get my attention and had to slow down a lot before getting back on the road. Might not have been asleep but pretty close. Only happened once though.

Do 60 miles each way enough times crap happens. Without a radio or drink it's easier than you'd think.

When will Tesla produce motorcycles?

When one of their cars, on autopilot, runs thru a metal power pole, making two separate 2-wheel halves.

My '85 Civic had no Autopilot.
After another heavy workday I suddenly found myself on the emergency lane at 75 mph, just inches away from the guard rail...

Kept a roll of glucose tablets in the car after that until I changed jobs and had a much shorter commute.
But I definitely would like to have AutoPilot. Better for my teeth.
(a lane departure warning by itself would be fine too)

The Tragic Crash of Flight AF447 Shows the Unlikely but Catastrophic Consequences of Automation

Sure, but that's like me saying plastic bags cause suffocation. I can produce examples of tragedy, but that isn't a harbinger of a looming epidemic. Despite the fact that automated systems make pilots worse at flying, there is still a net benefit to using them.

We don't base whether to use something on the worst possible outcome imaginable, we base it on the likely benefits vs the calculated problems (or at least we should, I still don't know why TSA is around).

I don't see "driver aids" in things like autopilot. I see "hey, lets take people already dangerously disengaged from driving and help them disengage even more."

If they are already disengaged, then automated aids can only help. Sure, there will be those that disengage further and occasionally cause accidents, but there will be an overall net benefit from all the times it prevents an accident.

My worthless anecdote is that my Subaru was totalled at a red light when it was rear-ended by a kid in a truck that didn't even attempt to slow down. I had been stopped for at least 5 seconds when he impacted me, so it's not like I slammed on the brakes. I was also bumped a year ago in stop and go driving from someone not paying attention. Then my wife was backed into by someone not looking behind. Oh, and I was backed into by a neighbor not looking behind their stupid jacked up truck.

All of these could be prevented with relatively cheap automation on new cars.

Laws against people using their phones while driving or engaging in other distraction doesn't prevent people from being distracted. There is simply no other reasonable way to further reduce accidents by addressing human behavior, so the logical next step is to approach the issue from the automation side.

Someone had an accident, nobody was hurt, we're not certain about the cause yet...
While hundreds lose their life in traffic on any average day.

As a generally attentive driver I still get surprises from time to time. For me, any system that would help to prevent an accident is a bonus, even though I would not trust my life on it driving the car for me.
Yet.

Exactly my thoughts Red.

In my travels to Montana a couple weeks ago, a deer off the road to my right, facing away from me caught my attention at dusk.

My reaction was to begin slowing down and check the other side of the road since they usually are found in herds. Sure enough, another deer jumped onto the road and stopped in front of me. I applied maximum braking, slightly screeching the tires, and must have stopped just inches from the deer.

Automated systems can view in 360 degrees, not grow sleepy, lose focus, and respond in fractions of a second. A good automated system would have identified the deer in the low light well before I could perceive it and more gradually slow down. Had someone been tailgating me, they would have hit me for sure... unless they had automated braking that can react in milliseconds.

Reminds me of my tour through Finland.

After a couple of days driving through the forest, with elk warning signs at 3 kilometer intervals, I finally encountered my first large wild beast, standing by the side of the road some 10 meters away from the tarmac.
A reindeer. And its 49 best friends and relatives.
Now these are huge; their antlers easily reach higher than my head.

I did not trust it one bit so I slowed down from 80 km/h (the speed limit) to say 40 and went past them. They did not react at all.
Then suddenly the herd went on a stampede, passed me on the right and hooked sharp left right in front of me. I slammed the brakes and got to a halt just a meter away from the closest reindeer...
Phew!

Got going again, then within 500 meters there's the first and only reindeer warning sign of my whole 3000 km trip...
Then a clearing strewn with the most bizarre works of art I've ever seen. In the middle of nowhere.
Amazing Finland.

Well, Teslas aren't exactly common :-)

Well, maybe. Perhaps a more pertinent question would be whether an autopilot system developed by urbanites, and mostly driven on urban freeway commutes, would even recognize a deer - or cow, bear, wild horse, antelope, buffalo, fallen tree or large rocks that've rolled down the mountainside, or any of the other things occasionally encountered on the road out here in the non-urban world. It's like the people who insist that they can bypass the snow-closed interstate by taking a single-land dirt road through the mountains in their low-clearance 2WDm, because their navigation systems say it's a road.

Like that time I didn't have cell service and followed my car nav despite signs on the side of the road saying it was closed.

http://ecomodder.com/forum/member-re...oad-closed.jpg

Apologies if I missed it but I just read that the driver claims to have been following a pickup that swerved suddenly to avoid the fire truck. Neither he nor the autonomous system could react quickly enough.

I think you did better than a computer could have. The computer won't be able to tell a deer from a cow say, or even some mailboxes for that matter. So those other things won't jump out in front of you, but the others are more common. Is it going to slam on the brakes for a mailbox on a sawhorse, or everytime you go past a pedestrian? Like you said, you saw one and got ready for more, a computer will never be able to do that effectively. How many other places do you become aware of potential problems before they happen? I remember watching the video where a self driving Tesla avoided a crash on a merge situation with a massive last minute brake event. They put it up as a win, but I could see what was happening 10 seconds before the Tesla did and a simple lift off the throttle would have avoided braking at all. My wife sometimes freaks out a bit while I'm driving and somebody cuts us off. I always tell her to relax, I could see that coming 3 cars back and I gave them just enough room to be an idiot.

When I first heard this story I thought the rental car must have had a bad GPS, but it looks like even old skool maps can lead you astray. This was a sad deal, a series of unfortunate events.

Deaths of mother, son in mountains last month leave many questions | News | missoulian.com

I have been stuck in waist deep snow with my family as well as my 6 year old twin nephews. It gets pretty scary fast and you just need to slow down and make good choices. We were 8 hours getting out with help and only 200 yards from a clear road. We had cell service and it was 60 degrees so were never in real danger but it gave me a ton of respect. Now I always carry a tow strap and Hi-lift jack when going into the mountains along with all the normal good clothes, blankets, food, etc.

I watched some presentation about the AI behind a self driving system and it will definitely distinguish between deer and cows, let alone mailboxes.
It will immediately isolate anything that moves. It will also determine whether other vehicles etc. have a normal position, direction and speed for their situation or not, again identifying potential hazards.

Maybe you are a better driver than that system in identifying the idiot driver ahead of time.
But the idiot driver would be served well by an autopilot system. If all cars had autopilot the roads would definitely be much safer.
Anyhow, we need to avoid branding autopilot as a cure for idiot drivers as that would block acceptance for the very drivers that need it most.

Cows can run faster than a man btw. What makes them road safe is the fence in between. No fence: take care.

I was knocked from a moped by a cow once. The cattle were crossing a road and I was waiting patiently for the herd to clear it when the farmer split the pack to let me through.
So I gingerly footed the moped engine off right in the middle of the road while the cows were standing on the side.
Then a cow turned its head to see what's going on and it swayed a meter towards me. Cows have a long head and neck...
Banged against my arm and down I went.

The question — as always — what are the consequences of walking?

That’s the one question calculated to get me to slow.

Spacing is everything, and speed a close second.

(Tesla drivers killing or maiming themselves is funny. Should’ve taken The Grey Dog.)

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