Driving On Autopilot May Just Kill You

largeyou know what’s crazy?
i’ve been seeing the telsa model s everywhere since i wrote about it.
remember how fascinated i was ( x with the auto pilot feature )?
well someone has allegedly died because of it.
a f-bi sent me the article from the huffington post and well…

Safety regulators in the United States are investigating a fatal crash involving a Tesla Model S that was using an “Autopilot” feature, Tesla Motors announced in a blog post Thursday.

The company said this is the first time someone has been killed while using Autopilot, which essentially drives the car for you. The crash happened on May 7, The New York Times reported.

“What we know is that the vehicle was on a divided highway with Autopilot engaged when a tractor trailer drove across the highway perpendicular to the Model S,” Tesla wrote. “Neither Autopilot nor the driver noticed the white side of the tractor trailer against a brightly lit sky, so the brake was not applied.”

The company said the crash took place under “extremely rare circumstances,” and that it was fatal because of where the Model S hit the trailer. It added that Autopilot is disabled by default and that a driver must explicitly acknowledge its experimental technology before using it.

The Model S will also tell drivers to keep their hands on the wheel; it alerts drivers and eventually slows down if they release their grip. Of course, even an instant of distraction can be deadly on the road.

Tesla released Autopilot on some of its vehicles last year. The limited autonomous feature allows the car to drive itself on major highways in the four states — California, Florida, Michigan and Nevada — plus the District of Columbia that have legalized self-driving cars on major roadways. When on private property, Tesla owners can summon their Autopilot-enabled cars with the click of a button. Tesla said the feature is disabled on public land, so the car can’t drive through a parking lot to meet its driver at the entrance to a store, for instance.

who here still wants a telsa model s for auto piloy?

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jamari didn’t raise his hands tho.
i told ya’ll that may have been an alleged segue to a mess.
driving requires control.
it’s not an airplane.
you got crazy ass drivers doing random shit all around you.
to even think of taking a nap behind the wheel is ridiculous to me.
animals are becoming too lazy due to their electronics these days.
next up: child birth on auto pilot.
smh.rip to that driver.

read full article: the huffington post

14 thoughts on “Driving On Autopilot May Just Kill You

  1. We will live to see a day when no insurance company will insure a car with a human driver. Tesla now claims that 130 million miles have been traveled on autopilot. If that is anywhere close to true, one fatality makes these cars far safer cars driven by men between the ages of 16-30. And, these are just the early days of self-driving, the equivalent of the Commodore Vic 20. Just wait until this tech reaches the metaphorical level of the macintosh, let alone the iPad. Those of us who fly, already trust our lives to machines whose human operators are only there in case of emergency.

    1. Jay – exactly.. I believe one day it will be illegal for humans to drive cars. As I and others have said, once these cars are able to talk to each other like airplane jets, car crashes will become rare. Around 35,000 people die in car accidents each year from human stupidity, yet the media will glorify these rare crashes involving autonomous cars.

  2. I still desire a Tesla and I shall have one hopefully by 2020. Elon Musk clearly told users, when that infamous video of that guy knock out sleep in a Tesla vehicle on his way to work became popular, that Teslas are level 2 self driving vehicles. A true self driving vehicle is level 4. There is no infrastructure for level 4 yet. I believe the man in the fatal accident was completely distracted while he was in the car. Hopefully a lesson can be learned. Drive your car until your car can truly drive you, or at least until the teleportation machine is created and mass marketed.

  3. There is more to this story…he was watching a DVD movie while using auto pilot…

      1. Oh yeah the driver of the truck he hit said Harry Potter was still playing when he went to go check on him.I didn’t know it was a DVD I thought he was watching it on his IPad.

      2. The software failed to apply the brakes because it couldn’t distinguish the white truck from the bright sky behind it and because the impact sensors on the front of the car pointed beneath the truck and didn’t trigger the brakes either. Both of those software glitches will be fixed long before people stop taking “just a quick glance” at their phones or trying to get a better grip on a hamburger or trying to holler at a shorty while operating human-driven cars. I continue to believe that driverless cars will soon be far safer for the people inside them and outside them than regular cars are. In fact, they may already be safer.

  4. I think the technology is a good thing. In the hands of a RESPONSIBLE driver, I don’t see it being a bad addition to have in a car. At first I was skeptical, but if humans work in TANDEM with this technology, I believe it can be a great thing. You can’t rely TOO much on the technology, you actually have to operate it. Just because it’s there doesn’t mean you can have your hand off the wheel and eyes off the road. The technology won’t kill people, stupidity will, and even when people are driving safe, accidents STILL happen. According to what was written above, both the auto-pilot and he didn’t sense it coming so I’m not sure if this was a freak accident or not, but in general, the same rules of the road apply.

  5. 35,000 people die in America each year from car crashes. I still believe autonomous cars will be safer than humans. Computers help keep human beings safe everyday so all the talk about the novelty of self driving cars is just a distraction. The big jets people get on everyday wouldn’t get in the sky without computer technology. And the reason why airplanes aren’t colliding with each is because each jet has computer tech that talks to each other. Once all cars are online with this tech, dying in your car will be a rare news story. This driver was watching Harry Potter while driving, and he also knew the auto pilot mode was still in beta testing when he enabled it.

  6. what is the point of auto pilot anyway?
    what do you have to be doing to want your hands off the wheel for long periods of time?

    1. The point in delivering Chinese-made iPhones from the Port of San Diego to New York city without having to stop for rest, food or pee-breaks. Most of the cost of transportation these days is labor. No driver equals cheaper transportation and higher profits / lower prices.

  7. The guy who died Joshua Brown has a YouTube channel.He used to post videos of him in the car while it was in self driving mode.He posted one where the car automatically changed lanes and averted an accident when someone cut him off.You can tell he loved that car and probably completely trusted the technology.

    I don’t even trust cruise control there is no way in Hell I would be comfortable with a car steering itself and changing lanes.I am not that adventurous.

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