Posted on 02/25/2020 3:27:03 PM PST by BenLurkin
The National Transportation Safety Board says the driver of a Tesla SUV who died in a Silicon Valley crash two years ago was playing a video game on his smartphone at the time.
Chairman Robert Sumwalt said at the start of a hearing Tuesday that partially automated driving systems like Teslas Autopilot cannot drive themselves. Yet he says drivers continue to use them without paying attention. He says the board made recommendations to six automakers in 2017 to stop the problem and only Tesla has failed to respond.
The board will determine a cause of the crash at the hearing and make recommendations to prevent it from happening again.
Sumwalt says government regulators have ignored the boards previous recommendations for measures to prevent these crashes.
The March 2018 crash involving a Tesla Model X SUV killed Apple engineer Walter Huang when it swerved and slammed into a concrete barrier dividing freeway and exit lanes.
Just before the crash, the Tesla steered to the left into a paved area between the freeway travel lanes and an exit ramp, the NTSB said. It crashed into the end of the concrete barrier. The cars forward collision didnt alert Huang, and its automatic emergency braking did not activate, the NTSB said.
Also, Huang did not brake, and there was no steering movement detected to avoid the crash, the boards staff said.
NTSB investigators previously found that Teslas system became confused at a freeway exit and was a factor in the crash.
(Excerpt) Read more at ktla.com ...
“I was born and raised in Cali, as was my mom in the 30s, and Ive always called it Cali”
You are definitely qualified to call it “Cali”. One of my daughters who lived for awhile in California named one of her children “Cali” (middle name, she doesn’t use it).
Playing video games while driving? He might as well have used the local grade school field for target practice during recess.
We’re all lucky this dangerous moron is dead.
“Decades ago you would see a car slightly weaving and you would think alcohol.
Now... Phone.”
One of my fellow grey haired bikers told me recently: “We used to be scared of rednecks in a pickup with a shotgun Now it’s a teenage girl in a Toyoto with a phone.”
He bangs !
lol
“Sounds like that hasnt been made clear to some drivers.”
Warnings are given to drivers who do not keep hands. on wheel or eyes on the road.
” Flying down the road controlled by sketchy software is just fine.”
Driver is to be in control at all times.
The Tesla system nags the driver periodically to touch the steering wheel to let the car know that the driver is paying attention. If not, it will eventually shut off the autopilot for the remainder of the trip.
But the system is defective in that it can be fooled by simple DIY hacks that inhibit the warnings and the eventual shutdown, as demonstrated in this video:
“How to trick autopilot in Tesla model 3”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFUwOwyvTlw
Tesla must be aware of this, but they don’t seem willing to fix the problem.
Wow. Then this guy was just asking for it, assuming the car warned him. If not, then it’s just common sense — just like when driving a regular car — which plenty of people lack.
So, where is the label “auto pilot” coming from?
The manufacturers or the drivers?
Could just call it Commiefornia - seems about right.
“But the system is defective in that it can be fooled by simple DIY hacks”
Sounds like the hacking drivers are defective.
Whats funny is, my mom always pronounced L.A. as Los Angle-us, with a hard g, and wed always tell her she was saying it wrong.
Then I saw a bunch of old movies of Los Angelenos talking, and they all pronounced it the was she did, with a hard g, Los Angle-us.
Turns out people in the 30s and 40s pronounced it different than today!
She was a Rosie The Riveter for Lockheed during the war, and saw the actual Zoot Suit riots when they happened.
I miss talking to her about the old days. She remembers the 1932 earthquake vividly, it almost toppled their house.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.