The Tesla Autopilot Crash Mystery...

[Master Disaster]

I'm sure many of you saw Anthony cover this on Tech Linked yesterday.

 

The basic story is, A Tesla Model S crashed into a tree and killed both passengers, when ES arrived they found 2 passengers, one in the front passenger seat and another in the back. The internet does what it always does and immediately blamed Autopilot....

 

Well Musk has responded, it was aimed at the WSJ who did an article claiming to be researched on the story. According to Musk it would be impossible for the AP system to have been turned on since the road the crash occurred on had no markings, his telemetry system says AP was disabled at the time of the crash and the absolute kicker, the car didn't even have the FSD function enabled at all.

 

That begs a pretty important question, how the hell did the crash happen then? The car was mangled beyond recognition so I'm going to discount the driver trying to crawl out from the passenger side, there was no passenger side left to crawl out of.

 

Could it be that someone has jailbroken the system? Its either that or the driver jumped out seconds before the car smashed into a tree and somehow survived in good enough shape to flee the scene.

 

Thoughts?

[.Apex.]

Hmm if there was no driver and the passenger on his side and the passenger seat are mangled, could it be that the driver survived and fled to not deal with repercussions? as he might have been driving erratically, or the death scene was overwhelming

 

If it's that then they should have been able to find who the car belonged to, though I don't know much about the story other than what you posted

[Nathanpete]

Just now, .Apex. said:

Hmm if there was no driver and the passenger on his side and the passenger seat are mangled, could it be that the driver survived and fled to not deal with repercussions? as he might have been driving erratically, or the death scene was overwhelming

 

If it's that then they should have been able to find who the car belonged to, though I don't know much about the story other than what you posted

OP specifically mentioned that the car was so mangled it would have been impossible to escape the vehicle without the help of ES. 

[.Apex.]

Just now, Nathanpete said:

OP specifically mentioned that the car was so mangled it would have been impossible to escape the vehicle without the help of ES. 

He only mentioned the passenger side being mangled, that's why I mentioned the possibility of the driver side

[Master Disaster]

Just now, .Apex. said:

He only mentioned the passenger side being mangled, that's why I mentioned the possibility of the driver side

See the photo, the car was destroyed almost to beyond recognition (even accounting for the roof being removed).

 

I find it hard to believe anyone could jump out of that and survive. Not impossible but pretty unlikely.

[.Apex.]

1 minute ago, Master Disaster said:

See the photo, the car was destroyed almost to beyond recognition (even accounting for the roof being removed).

 

I find it hard to believe anyone could jump out of that and survive. Not impossible but pretty unlikely.

That's fair, I also found a piece of information that suggests there was no 3rd person involved

 

"Police told The New York Times that minutes before the crash, the wives of the men involved heard them say they wanted to go for a drive and were talking about the vehicle’s Autopilot feature. The men were 59 and 69 years old."

[.Apex.]

10 minutes ago, .Apex. said:

That's fair, I also found a piece of information that suggests there was no 3rd person involved

 

"Police told The New York Times that minutes before the crash, the wives of the men involved heard them say they wanted to go for a drive and were talking about the vehicle’s Autopilot feature. The men were 59 and 69 years old."

Another thing to point out is that Autopilot and FSD (Full Self-Driving) are separate functionalities and subscriptions, and it was not mentioned whether Autopilot was purchased or not, Autopilot has a couple of features like Traffic Aware Cruise Control which sets the speed based on the cars in front of you, and Autosteer which keeps the car in-lane, considering how old these people are, is it possible that they've mistaken that for FSD?

 

Edi: Wait, Elon did mention Autopilot was not enabled, and it would requires lines to be enabled, nevermind

[Random_Person1234]

9 minutes ago, .Apex. said:

That's fair, I also found a piece of information that suggests there was no 3rd person involved

 

"Police told The New York Times that minutes before the crash, the wives of the men involved heard them say they wanted to go for a drive and were talking about the vehicle’s Autopilot feature. The men were 59 and 69 years old."

The article from The New York Times also said witnesses did not see a driver.

Quote

Mark Herman, the Harris County Precinct 4 constable, said that physical evidence from the scene and interviews with witnesses led officials “to believe no one was driving the vehicle at the time of the crash.”

 

[Velcade]

2 minutes ago, .Apex. said:

Another thing to point out is that Autopilot and FSD (Full Self-Driving) are separate functionalities and subscriptions, and it was not mentioned whether Autopilot was purchased or not, Autopilot has a couple of features like Traffic Aware Cruise Control which sets the speed based on the cars in front of you, and Autosteer which keeps the car in-lane, considering how old these people are, is it possible that they've mistaken that for FSD?

Try to set AP and then get out of the drivers seat.  Go ahead, give it a try.

[BuckGup]

I think people are over complicating things because it's a Tesla. It either sounds like someone ghost riding or the driver fled the scene because they just killed two people. 

[.Apex.]

31 minutes ago, Velcade said:

Try to set AP and then get out of the drivers seat.  Go ahead, give it a try.

Do you have a Tesla I can borrow? I might or might not return it

[Velcade]

7 minutes ago, .Apex. said:

Do you have a Tesla I can borrow? I might or might not return it

I wouldn't trust you 

[AndreiArgeanu]

37 minutes ago, Velcade said:

Try to set AP and then get out of the drivers seat.  Go ahead, give it a try.

People have circumvented the safety systems put in place in a Tesla numerous times, it may be difficult to do so, but it's definitely possible. Since there's numerous videos of people just being reckless doing this.

[Master Disaster]

Just now, AndreiArgeanu said:

People have circumvented the safety systems put in place in a Tesla numerous times, it may be difficult to do so, but it's definitely possible. Since there's numerous videos of people just being reckless doing this.

OK, but how do you circumvent the system not enabling without road markings? Or the telemetry data which (according to Musk) shows AP being disabled? Finally how did they get the car to break the speed limit?

[Velcade]

3 minutes ago, AndreiArgeanu said:

People have circumvented the safety systems put in place in a Tesla numerous times, it may be difficult to do so, but it's definitely possible. Since there's numerous videos of people just being reckless doing this.

You can place a brick on the gas and jump out too.  What's your point...

[WhitetailAni]

The Russians did it. /s

 

Jokes aside, this is just another mystery to put on the pile.

I forget how many there are now.

[Master Disaster]

24 minutes ago, BuckGup said:

I think people are over complicating things because it's a Tesla. It either sounds like someone ghost riding or the driver fled the scene because they just killed two people. 

So the crash was bad enough to kill both passengers yet the driver just walked away? Plus there are witnesses saying they saw the car with no driver.

[AndreiArgeanu]

4 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

OK, but how do you circumvent the system not enabling without road markings? Or the telemetry data which (according to Musk) shows AP being disabled? Finally how did they get the car to break the speed limit?

My point wasn't saying that whoever was in the car was using the autopilot, I was just saying that it's possible to circumvent the safety systems put in place, you're just going of a point I never made.

5 minutes ago, Velcade said:

You can place a brick on the gas and jump out too.  What's your point...

That it's possible to circumvent the safety systems. To me it seemed that you implied it's not possible, but it is.

[Velcade]

3 minutes ago, AndreiArgeanu said:

That it's possible to circumvent the safety systems. To me it seemed that you implied it's not possible, but it is.

Doing illegal things is always and will always be possible.  My point was there are safety measures in place to prevent driving without someone in the driver's seat.  If you choose to circumvent the safety system that's on you not on the manufacturer. 

[BuckGup]

11 minutes ago, Master Disaster said:

So the crash was bad enough to kill both passengers yet the driver just walked away? Plus there are witnesses saying they saw the car with no driver.

Could also be a case of extreme misunderstanding. They could have heard Teslas have autopilot so they put cruise control on and lane assist thinking it will be their personal driver than died.