Tesla has totally botched this. What Tesla has run into is the approach to safety that makes commercial air travel safe - figure out exactly what went wrong and fix it so it stays fixed. The aviation community is used to this. "Flying" magazine publishes crash reports in most issues.[1] Pilots read those. Manufacturers read those. People in aerospace read those. NASA collects near-miss reports to keep tabs on why close calls happened.
The aviation industry has experience with aircraft automation leading pilots into trouble, and so does the NTSB. Here's a former head of the NTSB commenting on the Asiana crash at SFO in 2014:[2] “How do we design this whole human-machine system to work better so we don’t lose the professionalism in the humans who are doing this?” Crash investigators are very aware of the problems of a poor man-machine interface leading pilots into a bad situation. That is the kind of thinking needed to make these kinds of systems work.
It's not about blame. Most air crashes have multiple causes. That's because the single points of failure were fixed long ago. This is somewhat different than the traffic law enforcement approach. The NTSB's previous investigation of a Tesla collision resulted in Tesla changing their system to enforce the hands-on-wheel requirement. That may not be enough.
Playing hardball with the NTSB is not going to work. The NTSB rarely uses it, but they have broad authority in investigations. They can get subpoenas. They can inspect Tesla's facilities, hardware, and software: "An officer or employee of the National Transportation Safety Board ... can ... during reasonable hours, may inspect any record, process, control, or facility related to an accident investigation under this chapter." The NTSB even has the authority to publicly disclose corporate trade secrets if necessary.[3] Aviation companies routinely cooperate, knowing this, and the NTSB seldom has to compel disclosure.
Incidentally, lying to the NTSB is a federal crime. The CEO of Platinum Jet Services tried to cover up some safety violations that resulted in a crash.
He became Federal Prisoner #77960-004 from 2007 to 2013.[4]
Yep, the NTSB is a federal agency that you do NOT want to screw around with. To me it's like Tesla wants to be an auto company, but it's some weird cargo cult version with a few parts missing
I think when you look at it from that perspective Tesla are in real trouble. Essentially what they're publicly stating is "Our car detected it was in a dangerous situation, gave warnings to the driver but took no action". That's really not good enough. I don't know of any other system in a car which is designed to allow you to take your hands off the wheel - because that seems to actively encourage you not to pay attention and to increase reaction time. I could definitely imagine the NTSB coming back from this investigation saying that Tesla's active advertising campaign suggesting that drivers should take their hands off their steering wheel is bad and played a significant role in this accident.
The question is whether repeated incidences could cause the NTSB to suggest removal of the autopilot feature entirely (in its current state).
I disagree. It's the dawn of autonomous driving; Tesla needed to get the message out that lives had been saved by that tech already, and did; etc. The Mandarins aren't moved by context, let's put it that way. They had no legal power to squelch Tesla, so after blustering as if they did, they have opted to use their more petty powers, as far as I can see. The Feds could have given some quarter, here, given the stakes - and I don't mean money. The Feds had powers enough but wanted to reach for powers over publicity that they didn't have.
I’m confused about how hands on the wheel is “enforced”? Just chiming and blinking lights? Or does the car actually shut off auto driving mode when you remove your hands?
Not sure why you mentioned Platinum Jet Services lying to NTSB. Tesla did not lye.
Tesla just want to communicate publicly regardless of the NTSB schedule. Tesla should not be bound by the NTSB agreement, it is a good thing that they got out of it.
NTSB is good at providing recommendations, and they would likely be very good recommendations, in few months when they would wrap up their investigation.
The aviation industry has experience with aircraft automation leading pilots into trouble, and so does the NTSB. Here's a former head of the NTSB commenting on the Asiana crash at SFO in 2014:[2] “How do we design this whole human-machine system to work better so we don’t lose the professionalism in the humans who are doing this?” Crash investigators are very aware of the problems of a poor man-machine interface leading pilots into a bad situation. That is the kind of thinking needed to make these kinds of systems work.
It's not about blame. Most air crashes have multiple causes. That's because the single points of failure were fixed long ago. This is somewhat different than the traffic law enforcement approach. The NTSB's previous investigation of a Tesla collision resulted in Tesla changing their system to enforce the hands-on-wheel requirement. That may not be enough.
Playing hardball with the NTSB is not going to work. The NTSB rarely uses it, but they have broad authority in investigations. They can get subpoenas. They can inspect Tesla's facilities, hardware, and software: "An officer or employee of the National Transportation Safety Board ... can ... during reasonable hours, may inspect any record, process, control, or facility related to an accident investigation under this chapter." The NTSB even has the authority to publicly disclose corporate trade secrets if necessary.[3] Aviation companies routinely cooperate, knowing this, and the NTSB seldom has to compel disclosure.
Incidentally, lying to the NTSB is a federal crime. The CEO of Platinum Jet Services tried to cover up some safety violations that resulted in a crash. He became Federal Prisoner #77960-004 from 2007 to 2013.[4]
[1] https://www.flyingmag.com/tags/aftermath [2] https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2014/october/21... [3] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/49/1114#b [4] http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/11/16/new.jersey.charter.convi...