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Tesla "autopilot" disengages shortly before impact 9

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MartinLe

MartinLe

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Oct 12, 2012
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"On Thursday, NHTSA said it had discovered in 16 separate instances when this occurred that Autopilot “aborted vehicle control less than one second prior to the first impact,” suggesting the driver was not prepared to assume full control over the vehicle."

Where I a legislating body, I would very much demand that safety critical software needs to be as transparent as any other safety feature. Which would limit "AI"/machine learning applications in these roles.
 
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The Dacia does the same phoning and there is a sos button on ceiling. Where you can manually trigger it.

It also has a data connection to maint system at Renault in certain countries.

 
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Yes, both OnStar and MBrace offer a manual 'emergency call' option as well. In fact, with OnStar, if you pay the monthly cellular charge, you can use it as a normal 'hands-free phone'.

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
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Do those systems only report to emergency services? The Tesla system reports to Tesla as well so they can forward the crash data to NTHSA. I think that is what the article implied, Tesla is the only company that receives automatic crash reports from its vehicles.
 
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No, the message first goes to an emergency desk at OnStar/MBrace, who then try contacting the driver of the car using the built-in cellular system (even if you haven't paid for the optional 'hands-free phone' it's still enabled for emergency use) and if they get no response, only then do they call 911.

Since OnStar and MBrace are ostensibly owned and operated by GM and Daimler, respectively, I would assume that the any accident data would be available to the car manufacturer, and while I don't know this for sure, I would assume that the information stored in the vehicles so-called 'black boxes' could also be accessed and downloaded via the onboard cellular system.

I know I get a monthly report, via email, from OnStar as to the current statistics of my GMC Terrain, including the status of any onboard warning systems, as well as remaining oil life, tire pressures, fuel levels, etc.

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Renault does as well if you are in one of the countries that it pays for a data package to the cars.

Tends to be all the central euro countries and Spain and Italy.

Eastwards it stops at the German Polish border. Wouldn't surprise me if it doesn't work in USA.

Also wouldn't surprise me if they have a different satnav system in it. As our one is GPS and Galileo.

And that only became legal in 2018 in usa

 
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No details yet as to whether this was an 'autopilot' issue or not, but it sort of feels like it:

2 dead in Tesla vehicle crash at Paynes Prairie rest area, FHP reports


An excerpt from the above item:

Two people were killed in a Tesla vehicle accident Wednesday after their car ran off an interstate and crashed into a stationary Walmart semi-trailer truck, according to Florida Highway Patrol.

Law enforcement say the vehicle was traveling on Interstate 75 but for unknown reasons exited for the rest area near Paynes Prairie. The vehicle then struck a Walmart Freightliner tractor-trailer that was parked in the resting area.

The driver and passenger in the Tesla, a 66-year-old female and 67-year-old male from Lompoc, California, were pronounced dead at the scene.

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Irvine, CA
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Seems like there ought not be any reason for the image processing to miss this truck
Alachua-double-fatal-crash_pd1hnx.jpg


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...not autopilot, it disengaged a split second before the impact. It was some other cause. [pipe]

So strange to see the singularity approaching while the entire planet is rapidly turning into a hellscape. -John Coates

-Dik
 
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No, that's a rest area. Those white strips are designating the parking spots. In fact, from the looks and location of the strips, this is where the 18-wheeler park, like that WalMart truck.

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without
 
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Very difficult to locate this "rest stop" on Google maps. There is a proper rest stop close by, but it doesn't look like this.

It looks to me like the truck was just stopped for some reason on the emergency lane and the tesla just ran straight into the back of it.

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.
 
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...not autopilot, it disengaged a split second before the impact. It was some other cause.
Click to expand...

My thought as well. Disengaging <1 second at highway speeds is so close to a collision that it makes you wonder why they bother disengaging at all.
 
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It's not the highway, that is a parking lot of a rest stop. It's the Alachua County Rest Area - Southbound side. Using Google maps, if I'm on the southbound highway I can see the same background as that picture across the northbound lanes. Go to about the start of the parking area near the entrance and look in front of the Penske truck.

In the rest stop, you drive in and then it branches to the left before reaching the truck parking area. The parking spots are at about a 30* angle so you have to turn left into the spot. They are drive through spots. The truck looks like it was actually parked in a spot and not just entering the rest area, so I have no idea how the car managed to turn left to hit it at that angle or that hard.

How it got off the highway into the rest stop is the easy part. The lane following system mistook the exit lane as a continuation of the highway and followed the lane marking lines into the parking lot at full speed.
 
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My thought as well. Disengaging <1 second at highway speeds is so close to a collision that it makes you wonder why they bother disengaging at all.
Click to expand...

Come on, you can't think of any reason to do that???

If the car wasn't on autopilot when it crashed then the crash doesn't get put under the autopilot crash column of the Tesla crash statistics spreadsheet. They can keep reporting how autopilot is safer than it really is.
 
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Did the autopilot maybe think it was a continuation of the road?

So strange to see the singularity approaching while the entire planet is rapidly turning into a hellscape. -John Coates

-Dik
 
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