The accident took place in California last week when a Model X crashed into a wall after the system warned the driver to put his hands on the steering wheel
he electric car maker Tesla has acknowledged that the autopilot mode was on when there was a fatal accident in one of its vehicles. It happened last March 23 on a road in Mountain View, California, in the vicinity of the headquarters of the company of billionaire Elon Musk. The accident was carried out by an X model car, which crashed into a concrete median dividing the roadway. At the wheel was a 38-year-old driver, who died shortly after the crash, and who had started the autopilot option. According to the company's studies, the driver had received several visual warnings and an audible autopilot system to get his hands on the wheel.
"The driver's hands were not detected on the steering wheel during the six seconds before the collision," Tesla explained on his website, adding that the deceased "had five seconds and 150 meters of clear vision of the concrete median", but "he did not take any action".
What Tesla does not explain is why his system did not detect and reacted to the obstacle. The autopilot function is capable of taking the car in a similar way to a self-driving vehicle, which does not require a driver. It can brake, accelerate and turn in certain conditions. However, it is classified as a driving assistance system, which should not operate independently, and the driver is required to always have his hands on the wheel.
It is not the first time that a Tesla vehicle has an accident of this type. In 2016, a Tesla driver was killed when the car went on autopilot and did not recognize a truck on the road. The system did not see "the white side of the truck trailer with lots of sunlight," said the company, which decided to implement changes in its system, such as automatic shutdown and car brake when it is detected that the driver is not behind the wheel for too much time.
Following the accident, an investigation by the US National Transportation Safety Council (NTSB, in its acronym in English), determined that Tesla "lacks understanding" about the limitations of its autopilot system, which allowed the driver "to use the system outside the environment for which it was created" and that gave too much room "to divert attention to things unrelated to driving".
After the second fatal accident, Tesla has insisted on the safety of their systems. On his website, he assures that cars in the US they suffer a fatal accident for every 138 million kilometers traveled, if all vehicles of all manufacturers are taken into account. Their cars with automatic pilot, however, suffer a fatal accident for every 514 million kilometers.
"The Tesla autopilot does not avoid all accidents - it would be an impossible standard to fulfill - but it makes much less. Inequivocally, it is safer for the occupants of vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists, "defends the manufacturer.
In spite of its data and its affirmations, the accident will shake a debate - the one of the independent driving - that has been reheated in the last days. Last month, an autonomous vehicle of Uber, the passenger transport company, was involved in a fatal accident during a test drive. It happened in Tempe (Arizona), when a car with this technology overwhelmed a woman who crossed the road at night with a bicycle in her hand. He is believed to be the first pedestrian to die in an accident with an autonomous driving car.
The vehicle had a safety driver, but it circulated autonomously. In the videos of the accident, it is seen that the Uber employee does not have his hands near the wheel, as established by the policy for these tests in the case of an emergency. In addition, you can see that it is looking down, perhaps at a monitor or screen, while the vehicle is traveling at 65 kilometers per hour. According to police data, the car - a Volvo XC90 equipped with Uber technology - did not slow down when the passerby crossed. According to "The New York Times," the accident occurred at a time when Uber was striving to reduce distance with other companies that develop prototypes of autonomous driving, such as Waymo, which have obtained much better results so far. The project managers at Uber wanted to convince the company's new CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, of the importance of this technology for the company's future with a trial trip in April in Arizona.
The accident forced Uber to suspend his tests in North America, where he had pilot projects in Arizona, Pittsburgh, San Francisco and Toronto.