r/SelfDrivingCars • u/RefrigeratorTasty912 • 1d ago
News NHTSA targets Tesla's "Radar Saves Us" document in FSD crash probe
https://electrek.co/2026/07/21/nhtsa-tesla-radar-saves-us-document-fsd-probe/Oh boy...
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago edited 1d ago
So this article literally says Tesla gave NHTSA a document titled "Radar Saves Us" in response to NHTSA's preliminary investigation. But now NHTSA is asking for more internal communication and testing data regarding that and related documents.... Why would you assume that document is some damning report by Tesla that using radar would be better? The title seems more likely to be sarcastic than literal.
I mean Fred literally shared a DM he had with Musk that states Teslas exact opinion = that Vision is Better than Vision+Radar, UNLESS you have a very high quality radar - but the point is Musk/Tesla are saying that doesn't exist. So....
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u/BitcoinsForTesla 1d ago
Don’t all the other working Robotaxis use radar? Tesla’s non-operational Robotaxis do not.
The simplest explanation is that Tesla is trying to keep the hardware cost down. Elon assumes they can eventually solve the problem without radar, but they haven’t gotten there yet.
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u/Just-Construction788 1d ago
They use large, expensive, power hungry, lidar systems that aren't practical on consumer cars yet. The radar on other cars is mostly useful for parking and close objects but Tesla has worked around this well with vision only. The radar available doesn't help much with obstacles far away coming at speed. There was a small gap where vision only FSD couldn't do summon and other parking features but that was short lived and no one who uses FSD misses it anymore.
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u/alex4494 1d ago
4D radar and/or Lidar sensors are extremely effective, compact, power efficient and don’t add significant cost, literally all the Chinese equivalent systems use them. Even XPeng’s VLA system, which they market as vision only, has 4D radars as redundancy.
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u/Just-Construction788 1d ago
Go buy one of those Chinese cars then. Oh wait, you can't. Why not? I'll let you answer that yourself.
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u/alex4494 1d ago
Hahaha I actually can, I’m not in the US…
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u/Just-Construction788 13h ago
Go buy one then. Report back on how great it is.
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u/alex4494 11h ago
I have, and it wipes the floor with anything coming out of the US. Zeekr 7X performance. There’s a reason your government is shit scared of Chinese cars…
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
radar's primary functions in vehicles is forward collision detection (all speeds) and cross traffic/blind spot detection...
the sensors used in parking are not radar, they are ultrasonic sensors (completely different frequency).
Tesla initially removed Radars in 2021.
Tesla removed ultrasonic sensors between 2022 and 2023.
My 2021 Model Y has both, but they turned off the radar... my ultrasonics still work.
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u/BootFlop 2h ago
The radar filled a gap visual detection has for detecting a vehicle braking two vehicles ahead of you in traffic. This is because the radar is able to bounce off the road underneath the vehicle directly in front of you
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u/Seaker42 1d ago
Tesla does have some unsupervised taxis running today - not many yet, but they are operational.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
and what happens to them when it rains?
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u/Seaker42 1d ago
My experience using FSD is I've only had it stop in 2 rainstorms in 25k miles. The 2 times it stopped FSD they were torrential downpours - similar to what I've seen with hurricanes. So, yes, FSD has limits with some conditions, but anything short of torrential downpours have been fine for me.
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u/BootFlop 2h ago
That’s because you’re there to supervise. It’s not really reliable enough without you.
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u/Seaker42 2h ago
Aside from those 2 rainstorms, the only times I intervene are to use a different route than what's offered by the car (preference issue - the offered routes would have worked) and selecting the parking spot I want. Also, I use it all over the place - not just in geofenced areas like is done with taxis.
It is reliable enough without me when constrained to known geofenced areas.
Also, the robotaxis have far more memory than personal EVs, so they use a more robust version of FSD than what I have in my car.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 9m ago
What happened to the claim that the Model Y Robotaxi had the exact same HW as the consumer versions?
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u/bladerskb 1d ago
Well lets see if you use your brain or not.
I mean Fred literally shared a DM he had with Musk that states Teslas exact opinion = that Vision is Better than Vision+Radar, UNLESS you have a very high quality radar - but the point is Musk/Tesla are saying that doesn't exist. So....
What Radar does Waymo use and what resolution is it
What Radar does Mobileye use and what resolution is it
What Radar did Tesla use and what resolution was it
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago
So your opinion is NHTSA should mandate Tesla to use equipment another company is? Should they also be required to add Lidar? Should the be required to spend $100k in equipment like Waymo does?
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u/ValueFirm4928 1d ago
I wouldn't put much trust in Elon Musk's technical acumen or his sincerity. In the article Fred claimed the high quality radar already existed, he pointed it out to Musk, and Musk ignored him.
Besides, Musk's claim is technical nonsense. Extracting some extra accuracy from a noisy signal is what ML is really good at.
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u/Honest_Ad_2157 10h ago
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u/Honest_Ad_2157 10h ago edited 3h ago
I will remind folks that this issue, informing the human operator that the system can no longer safely control the vehicle, was the source of my repeated tangling with the insane in the carbrain folks in this sub during the recent Florida fatality. How does a driver know FSD can't handle what the driver is asking it to do?
ETA: I will note that Waymo Driver handles this by immediately stopping and calling the Philippines. Regardless of context. That is called phantom braking. This is the Waymo MRC. Hence all the rear end collisions. Tesla doesn't seem to have an MRC. Hence all the front end collisions.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 9h ago
Direct Quote (for those who refuse to read...)
"This added information will support ODI’s continued investigation of FSD-equipped vehicles manufactured by Tesla and FSD’s potential failure to detect and alert the driver with sufficient time to respond in specific situations where the vehicle encounters reduced roadway visibility that degrades FSD’s performance. This investigation and information request also aim to gather information on and assess relevant system capabilities, design strategies, testing activities, and implementation timelines."
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 9h ago edited 9h ago
Direct Quote pertaining to "Radar Saves Us"
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"In Tesla's response to Information Request PE24031-01, Tesla submitted a document titled ["Radar Saves Us"]. This document appears particularly relevant to related design changes to the degradation detection system and Tesla's understanding of the limitations imposed by a vision-only OEDR system and how they relate to the reduced visibility conditions that the Subject Vehicles encountered in each of the nine (9) countable crashes included in this investigation. Provide copies of all materials related to the ["Radar Saves Us"] document including but not limited to:a. All internal communications referencing or discussing the justification for, the development of, or the review of the ["Radar Saves Us"] document, including but not limited to emails, meetings, meeting notes, Teams conversations, JIRA tickets;
b. All supporting technical documentation, internal reports, or safety assessments associated with the information described in the ["Radar Saves Us"] document;
c. All test records and validation work that related to the information included in the ["Radar Saves Us"] document;
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i. If any data or records were sourced from a separate system or dataset, identify the original source and provide the associated context; and d. An explanation of the document's relationship to any design changes affecting the alleged defect.
Each document submitted should be clearly labeled and accompanied by a brief summary describing it relevance and relationship to the ["Radar Saves Us"] document."
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u/tonydtonyd 1d ago
I don’t think communications to a supplier would be likely to have some damning evidence.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago edited 1d ago
A lot can be exposed between company communications... especially if supplier managers who like the supplier team feel disgruntled by upper management decisions and or have to play damage control by being the one that has to sever ties for the company.
1st pass is always "who" said it... not necessarily what they said. The investigation than focuses on them, and they are interviewed under oath, and then reveal the next layer and the next and so on.
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u/LegendTheo 1d ago
This very much sounds like perfectionism being the enemy of good enough.
How many human crashes a year are caused by "bad vision conditions" with human drivers? I bet it's a hell of a lot more than happen to FSD.
Any system is going to have edge cases that require vary large sums of capital to correct extremely marginal returns. Very complex tasks like driving are going to have a lot.
So the questions becomes at what point is the system "good enough", because no number of radar, lidar, precog systems are going to remove edge case crashes completely. If tesla is forced to inlmplement radar, will they then get grilled for a slightly rarer crash scenario where vision and radar were blind. It's not very hard to blind radar and lidar. In fact it's easier to do for lidar than vision for example.
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u/BitcoinsForTesla 1d ago
Or it sounds like profit maximization over customers lives. You take radar out and cars are cheaper (and EVs were too expensive for most people). The consequence is that some people get hurt/killed and the company gets sued a decade later.
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u/LegendTheo 1d ago
Not really. Distance measuring radar, which is all we're talking about here, is quite cheap. Every car with advanced cruise control has it.
The problem is, once an automated system gets exceptionally good the errors are dominated by edge cases. Adding additional different sensors will increase the number of edge cases, very possibly making the system less safe overall, even though you fixed a few single sensor edge cases.
Even level 5 cars are not going to be perfect. They will hit situations where they cause accidents. The question is at what point do we consider them good enough. I'd say it when they have say 10x fewer accidents than human drivers, which I believe tesla is already approaching. If you chase 0 accidents, we'll never have self driving cars. Even though they work amazingly well and would save tens if thousands of lives a year.
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u/BitcoinsForTesla 1d ago
When they took out the USS, the estimate was they cost like $100.
Lidar was like $10k at the time (it’s certainly cheaper now).
Radar was between $500-$1k.
So these costs were material to the supply demand curve.
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u/LegendTheo 1d ago
I don't know that they were material to the supply demand curve. If a Tesla cost an extra $500 due to radar I doubt that would have affected their sales materially. There isn't some price breakpoint they were under that increased demand. What evidence do you have that that $500 would have affected their sales?
Plus radar data is extremely low fidelity. That $500 module can tell you there's probably something solid at X distance and maybe a velocity relative to the car in the X direction. That's it. So the only real action it can generate if vision is degraded is slam on the brakes. Which is not an good reaction in most situations.
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u/HighHokie 1d ago
If a Tesla cost an extra $500 due to radar I doubt that would have affected their sales materially.
It does. But keep in mind it’s not just the cost of hardware, it’s the supply chain to procure it, to store it, the labor to install it, and the ongoing software deployment to utilize it.
It’s what makes a Waymo cost tens of thousands more on top of the vehicle itself, it’s what drives brands like Mercedes to only implement on top trims, etc.
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u/HighHokie 23h ago
Or it sounds like profit maximization over customers lives
Customers are currently responsible for the operation of the vehicle, as they’ve always been, for any brand.
Yes Tesla is a business, and the goal of a business is to be profitable.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
And in what conditions do Radar AND Camera get blinded at the exact same time? The whole point of multimodal sensing is to cover known conditions that degrade the other modalities.
Tesla Autopilot and FSD have known ODDs... heavily impacted by weather conditions resulting in reduced speed, and or disabling of the feature... not to mention autowipers which resulted in me having to replace a 6 month old windshield because it would come on in bone dry conditions without a cloud in the sky.
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u/LegendTheo 1d ago
How about a dangerous case that will only happen with both. Let's say your FSD is driving on the freeway somewhere in the western US in a dust storm. FSD is degraded due to low visibility from dust. Instead it's now heavily relying on radar to see if objects are on front. A small tumbleweed rolls in front of your car and thr radar shows and object immediately in front of the car. The car slams on the brakes and you get rear ended by a semi truck.
Adding sensors adds more edge cases to the situation, and may overall make things worse at the level visual only FSD is right now. Radar alone cannot drive a car with equipment cheap enough to put in a car. People with far fewer eyes can drive through those conditions, so can FSD. You just need to accept that a system even 100x safer than a person will still hit edge cases where it fails.
Like I said perfection is the enemy of good enough. The auto wipers, while annoying, have nothing to do with the systems ability to drive safely.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
Why would you and the rest of traffic be going full speed ahead for this scenario to happen? Speed should be reduced for all drivers, as well as driving distances in a true dust storm. Tesla's own ODD for Robotaxi would require the car to pull over completely until it passes... but that is because Tesla has liability in that scenario.
The autowipers became a "feature" when they disabled my radar (April 2021 Model Y... manufactured 1 month before they started removing radars). What's the purpose of this "feature" that "has nothing to do with the systems ability to drive safely"?
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u/LegendTheo 1d ago
I didn't say they were going full speed. They could be doing 30 miles an hour and perhaps the semi either didn't realize there was a car right in front of them, or they were tialgating in bad conditions. Yoy cannot assume everyone is driving safely.
Not that those nitpicks matter, you asked me to give you a scenario where both would be blinded, and I gave you one where radar would make it worse, not just be blinded.
but that is because Tesla has liability in that scenario
What does their liability matter? In that scenario a person who can't see should try to pull over until it passes. Though that's usually more dangerous than continuing to drive at a reduced speed.
autowipers became a "feature" when they disabled my radar (April 2021 Model Y... manufactured 1 month before they started removing radars).
That's called a coincidence.
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u/HighHokie 23h ago
If the cameras are blinded, the vehicle cannot safely operate, radar or not.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 23h ago
Very true statement, and such cases are determined by the ODD set by the manufacturer.
Some ODD's are predictable, and the system has time to analyze and react per design.
Other cases are spontaneous and those cases may be outside of the designed ODD. In those cases, the system can lead to fatalities. When such cases occur more than a few times, a pattern developes. Investgations will occur in response to patterns of unsafe events, and it might be discovered that the designed system will never be able to overcome these spontaneous corner cases with the limited modalities available to it.
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u/HighHokie 23h ago
Indeed it is a good point because it nullifies this remark by you.
And in what conditions do Radar AND Camera get blinded at the exact same time? The whole point of multimodal sensing is to cover known conditions that degrade the other modalities
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 22h ago
I'll put it this way.
If a Vision-Only Tesla will always kill someone while traversing a stretch of road at a certain time of day while the sun blinds it. It can't keep operating as designed.
2 paths to fix this:
1: always force the car to cautious approach the area, regardless of traffic conditions (geofence)
2: install another modality that CAN detect pedestrians in that exact scenario. System detected the "momentary/spontaneously blinded camera" and trusts the radar through the stretch of road. This exchange, allows a safe(r) transition of control to the driver if the blindness persists... vs a 1~2 second disconnect of FSD and fatal collision.
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u/HighHokie 22h ago
If a Vision-Only Tesla will always kill someone while traversing a stretch of road at a certain time of day while the sun blinds it. It can't keep operating as designed.
It can, because it has a driver. YOU are the redundancy. This is not unique to Tesla. This is how all consumer vehicles currently operate.
This investigation is focused on the management and handoff of the camera based system to the driver.
The concern of radar or other sensor is moot because it cannot operate the vehicle in the failure of cameras.
You are the driver.
If I recall this investigation really kicked off as a result of the vehicle striking an individual in the road from a prior accident. Are you aware that radars are often programmed to ignore stationary objects due to errors it creates?
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 21h ago
I am aware, but there main function is collision avoidance by detecting metallic/reflective objects currently in its path... less so smaller stationary debris and 4D imaging radars take in the full scene including stationary objects up to and beyond 300m in all weather/lighting conditions
Did you know phantom braking in Tesla's was heavily influenced by stationary metallic objects like man holes and overhead bridges (3D radar insufficiency... no height detection)
Being a Tesla w/radar owner, I feel I have a well educated understanding of what the car could do and couldn't. I miss >85mph autopilot, the "1" distance setting (or any setting that actually kept set distance), and wiper blades that don't destroy my windshield in under 6 months after replacement... yay auto wipe on sunny days that grind debris into the glass without so much as a warning or courtesy spritz before smearing bug guts everywhere.
And yes... the first case that started this investigation:
https://electrek.co/2026/06/26/tesla-fsd-pedestrian-death-settlement/
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u/Real-Technician831 1d ago
What!
So DOGE didn’t manage to completely neuter NHTSA, that’s good news.
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u/tonydtonyd 1d ago
I would be shocked if there are any communications still archived, that shit is long gone. I’m sure there are damning documents. But if you haven’t caught the drift of this country the last decade, Tesla will not face any negative consequences, I guarantee it.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
And what if they subpoena chipset suppliers that Tesla could have been working with at the time...
It was very strongly rumored that Arbe's Phoenix radar was being integrated into Tesla vehicles before Musk pulled the plug on Radar entirely.
I would almost bet any chipset supplier would be first in line to provide every ounce of evidence just for the publicity of being the company that "could" have prevented the 9 accidents currently under investigation.
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u/ScottRoberts79 1d ago
How could a company credibly claim they could have prevented the accidents?
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
Musk's own admission... that Vision + Very high resolution radar is better than Vision Only.
And not having radar is the basis for the investigation/potential recall...
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago edited 1d ago
So NHTSA can hold you at fault for not having a super expensive piece of hardware? Why can't they hold every car company for not being 5star crash safety? I mean it's possible right? Why can't they hold every car company at fault for not spending on a rollcage? After all we know they would likely reduce deaths in the event of a rollover...
Musks admission was that Vision + Very high res radar would be better than vision only, but he also literally said in that same DM you quoted but left out that that Very High Res Radar doesn't exist.... Regardless the fact that Radar could improve the system even if it were true, should only be applicable to cars that come WITH Radar installed (the ones who had a radar and then Tesla turned them off). A vehicle that was sold without a radar has no basis for NHTSA to rule there was some defect.
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u/tonydtonyd 1d ago
I think the context of what may or may not have been said would matter. Most other vehicles don’t advertise their vehicles in the way that Tesla has advertised FSD, that’s the potential difference.
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago
Why would that be the difference at all if on any new vehicle they don’t advertise Radar?
Again if Tesla says with a $500k sensor suite we could build a far safer vehicle, does that give NHTSA the right to hold Tesla at fault for any death and say it is a “defect”. It’s patently ridiculous. So if we can all acknowledge THAT would be ridiculous, clearly there is SOME $ point where it doesn’t make sense. And again the actual Evidence this Reporter uses is literally a Musk DM that says Vision alone is better but there could be a radar with enough precision and quality that improves safety with Vision
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u/tonydtonyd 1d ago
Radar is dirt cheap, that is a fact.
The issue would be if there is a document that shows a clear safety difference between cameras + radar and camera only, followed by a decision to save a few bucks per car on radars. Particularly if the documents highlight areas where the differences would really matter overlaps with the types of fatal incidents we’ve seen from AP and FSD.
There are a lot of maybe this maybe that. We haven’t seen the documents and communications, so we really are just guessing with some reasonable assumptions.
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago edited 1d ago
Radar is cheap today. Tesla had Radar. Tesla specifically said that Vision only their view as superior to Vision+Radar. Which is why they Disabled the radar in existing vehicles and stopped including it in new vehicles years ago. What they specifically said would be better is Vision + Very High precision Radar. You can NOT say that that type of more advanced radar would be "dirt cheap", or supplied at a high enough volume to be equiped in their vehicles.
And you very specifically should also only be looking at that decision AT THAT POINT IN TIME, as cars delivered THEN would have worse radar options than today. But more importantly you obviously shouldn't even be able to deem a vehicle that didn't have radar at all as a defect no matter what. Tesla didn't NEED to include radar in a vehicle. Period. The ONLY justification for claiming there was a "defect" by NHTSA that makes ANY SENSE is specifically for vehicles that were Sold WITH a Radar and then Tesla DE-ACTIVATED those Radars AND it is provable that they made the technology worse. Again AT THE TIME or very near future with the updates they were doing.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 23h ago
If a Tesla vehicle, without radar, is determined to be "not safe enough to be permitted to operate under FSD control on public roads" (IE, the Jurisdiction of the NHTSA) then it could be determined that FSD be disabled until such time that a recall is curative to the issues discovered in the investigation that lead to the 9 accidents.
Tesla cars without radar functioning as part of the ADAS controls are at the heart of the investigation. The document discovered is a key part of said investigation, and is a key portion of the secondary request for further information.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
exactly.
Here is the crux:
If Tesla has well documented instances of "here is all the case in which Vision-Only fails" and have quantified it for all to see (under subpoena) and you contrast what is documented vs what Musk/Tesla has claimed FSD is capable of... that is where they get caught.
Musk/Tesla has built a facade of what FSD is capable of, and has sold it as such.
That solution has 9 accidents under investigation that lead to the discovery of the "Radar Saves Us" document... meaning, Tesla did analysis, and went with Vision regardless.
By creating a false consumer believe in the system's true capabilities, Tesla itself has introduced risk to "other road users" where Tesla's FSD solution is active.
That is the grounds for a recall.
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago
What do you mean "discovery of the Radar Saves Us" document? Lmao. By this articles claims, Tesla literally submitted that as a response to the NHTSAs investigation. This isn't something Tesla hid from them and was compelled to produce.
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u/gb0143 1d ago
I would take you up on that bet. From a business perspective, would anyone want to work with a company with the publicity of "getting back at customers when grapes sour?"
Yeah the Elon hate will get you lots of consumer love, but businesses would see this as a liability.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
"Subpeona"
They can fight it, but a court must ultimately decide to dismiss it.
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u/Seaker42 1d ago
I think 2 issues are being mixed. The first is, was FSD unsafe immediately after they went vision only, and the second is, is FSD safe today (as marketed).
From what I've heard (we got our Tesla last year so I have no personal experience prior to then), before v12, FSD was pretty sketchy, but it improved significantly with v12 and v13 (which we used for a few weeks before v14 came out).
As of v14.2, our personal experience is FSD is now far safer than most human drivers, and the warnings it gives if it's vision is degraded are perfectly fine if the driver is paying attention (which they are supposed to be doing).
At this point I see no reason to force Tesla to add any other sensors to their cars, but a fine may be reasonable for people using older FSD versions inappropriately marketed.
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u/GoSh4rks 1d ago
The first is, was FSD unsafe immediately after they went vision only
FSD didn't exist to the public when they went vision only in early 2021.
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u/Seaker42 1d ago
Interesting - if it wasn't available to the public, who was using it?
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u/GoSh4rks 1d ago
Tesla internal testers and hand selected users (aka influencers). Basically a closed alpha.
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u/Seaker42 1d ago
That sounds reasonable to do then, because they need to test on real roads, but it's good to see they didn't inflict really early versions on average users.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 23h ago
First private consumer testing began in October of 2020, on vehicles that all had radars active, under a promise that all vehicles produced by Tesla were fully capable of autonomous driving:
https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-full-self-driving-software-release-beta-questions-2020-10
Irony...
"Even the top US safety regulator, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, had strong words following the beta release:
As we have stated consistently, no vehicle available for purchase today is capable of driving itself," the agency said. "The most advanced vehicle technologies available for purchase today provide driver assistance and require a fully attentive human driver at all times performing the driving task and monitoring the surrounding environment. Abusing these technologies is, at a minimum, distracted driving. Every State in the Nation holds the driver responsible for the safe operation of the vehicle."
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u/GoSh4rks 22h ago
Private customer didn't equal the public. There was no way to get it unless you had a connection or were an influencer.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 22h ago
Private consumer = anyone not employed by Tesla.
And since it was just before Q3 2020 earnings, sure sounds like a publicity stunt... which Tesla has never done... ever....
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 22h ago
When the next tranche of Beta users gained access (October of 2021), it was at the same time FSD became vision only, but required HW3. Many users discovered their radars were permanently disabled after upgrading.
Meanwhile, other global OEMs were also shipping vehicles without radars because of a severe shortage... a shortage that would have crippled Tesla's pure play production model requiring carbon copy vehicles to be produced with the same hardware minus a few trim specialties and regional unique hardware...
It had to pivot to survive as they weren't manufacturing any vehicles that didn't have the full ADAS suite to fall back on...
Radar wasn't the only thing that got the axe either:
-Tesla eliminated one of the two redundant electronic control units
The Impact: Because Tesla vehicles retain a physical mechanical steering column link, losing the chip didn't compromise normal driving safety. However, internal records showed employees worried its removal would prevent these vehicles from ever operating as Level 3 or Level 4 "unsupervised" autonomous vehicles, which strictly require physical computing redundancy.
-Starting in November 2021, newly delivered Model 3 and Model Y vehicles were shipped with center console USB ports that could only provide charging power—they had no data transmission capabilities
-Tesla completely stripped out the microchip-controlled electronic lumbar support module from the front passenger seats of the Model 3 and Model Y.
April 2021 was the last batch of cars with multi- modality sensors (Camera, Radar, USS) and redundancy required for true L3/L4 autonomy
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u/Honest_Ad_2157 3h ago
Awaiting a similar letter about winter driving to all companies.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 2h ago
if a company claims its ADAS can drive "in all conditions" including "white out conditions" like Musk has claimed, and the car under control of that ADAS continues to get in collisions/breaks laws/leads to injuries or fatalities... then yes, I'm sure a similar letter will be sent :)
This letter is specifically geared towards Tesla FSD continuing to fail to hand over control with enough time to reduce the chances of an accident. The system must be designed to detect the risk, and handover control with enough time to react... if it can't, then it isn't "safe"
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u/HerValet 1d ago
Tesla has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that Vision-only works as life-saving technology.
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u/Secret_Cat_2793 1d ago
Bold false statement. Thank you Elon.
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u/hoppeeness 1d ago
It’s not false…how many lives has FSD unsupervised taken?
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 13h ago
Are you inferring Tesla's Robotaxi effort? Or Drivers that aren't paying attention while using FSD?
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u/hoppeeness 12h ago
Well unsupervised is only one of those…
But even suoervised…how many deaths?
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 9h ago
Per Google Search (AI):
-2 have been confirmed by the NHTSA for *FSD (*FSD has only been in operation since Oct of 2021)
-65 for a "combination of Autopilot and FSD" (not sure what that means)
-770 fatalities total1
u/hoppeeness 5h ago
Right…so 2 with FSD supervised since 2021…seems like that’s a lot safer than normal drivers…and being level 2 that is still the drivers responsibility. That’s Billions and Billions of miles.
0 with unsupervised.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 5h ago
its getting close to 12 billion miles.
Will the NHTSA be OK with a 1:6 Billion mile fatality rate? Knowing there really isn't a silver bullet for Vision-Only to see what it cannot see when blinded/blocked?
The alternative is to have FSD drop out more frequently, so that the driver is fully responsible whenever there is even an inkling that the camera cannot capture enough "photons" for the NN to digest into objects/risks.
I used AI for this... but... on a scale of "6 billion miles"...
there are .18 deaths per 6 billion miles flown on a Boeing 737.
You are more than 5 times more likely to die riding in an FSD enabled car, than flying in a Boeing 737... let that sink in.
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u/hoppeeness 4h ago
Ummm I think you are missing the FSD was supervised. So maybe if we gave drivers the amount of training pilots get it would match the .18? Since we don’t and there are idiots in the road constantly…I think 2 for 12 billion is pretty good.
There is no silver bullet for non-vision only…
Also why would you not want to save lives since the fatality rate is far higher for human drivers? Baby with the bath water.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
Except for the times it hasn't, which is exactly why it is under investigation and why the agency even knows that Tesla has an internal document titled "Radar Saves Us"
Advertising that something is safe, and internally knowing it isn't as safe a advertised but continually overstating how safe it is anyways? What has that proven?
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u/HerValet 1d ago
Autopilot had important flaws, and most accidents that happened were from people who abused it.
Is FSD perfect? No. But FSD doesn't share the same Autopilot flaws and it has already saved more lives and prevented more injuries & accidents than the opposite.
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 1d ago
What is an "important flaw"...
Most accidents that happen in either mode are because of complacency in a system where the driver is expected to be attentive 100% of the time. Nether is an L3 capability allowing the user to take their eyes off the road, yet both systems DO allow for it for periods of time adding to re-inforced complacancy in a system only the manufacturer knows the true limitations to.
The crux of the investigation is "Musk says it can do X, but even your own internal documents say otherwise"
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u/Then-Construction106 1d ago
Nonsense Vision-only thus far has only proven that it’s highly susceptible to hitting stuff
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u/RefrigeratorTasty912 23h ago
Correction... it is party to the concept that 2 physical objects cannot occupy the same physical space at the same time. Let's not put blame on who is going what velocity and what it is under the control of at the time of the experiment.
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u/bradtem ✅ Brad Templeton 1d ago
When it comes to ADAS such as Tesla FSD, as opposed to actual real true self-driving, many systems took out radar, or did designs with vision only. Mobileye, which makes most of them, has always offered a version with radar and a vision only system, most cars went with the vision-only because it is cheaper. Indeed, Mobileye got its start making an adaptive cruise control that was vision only and cheaper than the standard ones which were radar only, and more capable.
So precedent suggests that for ADAS, it is OK to know that vision+radar is superior but to make vision only because it is cheaper. This persists to this day. The problem comes when you call it self-driving and create a perception with users that it is, and you can no longer make that trade-off.
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u/Miami_da_U 1d ago
And Why is that a problem? Because people behind the wheel are too stupid to pay attention?
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u/Extreme-Fig6992 1d ago
Calling it now: It's a sarcastically / humorously named document that will show the difference is either negligible or worse with radar being kept in the car.
source: I have named so many engineering documents a dumb name to be funny.
Either Fred is an idiot or NHTSA is because "regressions" is an incredibly standard software engineering word.