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Online Videos Shame Two Sleeping Tesla Drivers (jalopnik.com)
Electrek reports:
A Tesla Model S driver in Southern California was caught on camera seemingly asleep at the wheel while driving on Autopilot... Kevin Paschal from Southern California shared the video on Facebook and said about the incident: "Highlight of my day. Dude is passed out on the freeway in his Tesla and still driving better than 90% of SoCal, lol... Dude was perfectly centered in his lane the whole time and maintained a safe distance from all vehicles...."
In this case, it looks like the driver has at least one hand over the bottom half of the steering wheel, which could be enough to avoid any Autopilot alert -- thought that's not always the case. Paschal said that the driver was like that for "several miles" and when asked why he didn't honk to attempt to wake him or get him to pay attention, he wrote, "I'm not sure the car would have cared...."
You should definitely attempt to wake the driver up if it can be done safely. As for the driver falling asleep, there are basically two schools of thoughts here. One could say that the driver would have fallen asleep anyway, as drivers do, and Autopilot actually made the situation a lot safer. Others would argue that the convenience aspect of Tesla's Autopilot might have actually contributed to putting the driver to sleep.
BGR also reports on a second incident where "If anything, the Tesla driver in the video is so relaxed that he's not even at the wheel; he's full-on reclining."
"This is why I personally think Level 2 autonomy is a bad idea," warns Jalopnik. "If it's possible for a moron like this to sleep while the car is driving at highway speeds, that's a huge problem."
In this case, it looks like the driver has at least one hand over the bottom half of the steering wheel, which could be enough to avoid any Autopilot alert -- thought that's not always the case. Paschal said that the driver was like that for "several miles" and when asked why he didn't honk to attempt to wake him or get him to pay attention, he wrote, "I'm not sure the car would have cared...."
You should definitely attempt to wake the driver up if it can be done safely. As for the driver falling asleep, there are basically two schools of thoughts here. One could say that the driver would have fallen asleep anyway, as drivers do, and Autopilot actually made the situation a lot safer. Others would argue that the convenience aspect of Tesla's Autopilot might have actually contributed to putting the driver to sleep.
BGR also reports on a second incident where "If anything, the Tesla driver in the video is so relaxed that he's not even at the wheel; he's full-on reclining."
"This is why I personally think Level 2 autonomy is a bad idea," warns Jalopnik. "If it's possible for a moron like this to sleep while the car is driving at highway speeds, that's a huge problem."
Better that than dozing off without autopilot.
This is the fact that the populist human first sceptics should admit to. Given that, these sorts of stories aren't a problem; as the quote admits, the car was driving safely.
Yeah, this is what the anti-autonomous driving cars crowd should realize. They may enjoy driving, but if they saw what was REALLY happening around them, they'd really wish that technology was out there right now.
People asleep at the wheel - it's so bad some cars come with alertness detection technology to suggest when you should pull over or get a coffee. Then there's all that distracted driving out there - not just texting anymore, but doing god-knows-what on their phones (texting, reading, watching movies, etc). It's so bad distracted driving has displaced drunk driving as the number one killer.
The truth of the matter is that driving is no longer the #1 activity done behind the wheel for a good chunk of the driving population , and that should scare anyone who wants to stay safe on the road.