Tesla autopilot saved the driver's life: drove to the hospital

37-year-old lawyer Joshua Neally decided to quit his job early last Tuesday. He got into his Tesla Model X electric car and went home. The road from the office to the house takes him only 45 minutes. He rode on the highway, which is always loaded. In order not to strain too much on the way, he activated the autopilot function. Niall heard about Tesla electric car accidents, but didn’t worry too much about it. He loved his car, and even gave her his own name. After the purchase, he tested the Autopilot feature and was pleased with it. After that, Joshua began to frequently use the capabilities of the “assistant driver”. As a lawyer, he was well aware of the importance of the information specified in the instructions, and always used the autopilot, as recommended by the developers. No movies or games in the car, and hands are always on the steering wheel.

Usually the way home was simple and pleasant. But this time something unexpected happened. Having traveled just a few kilometers, Niall felt a sharp chest pain . So acute that he began to lose the sense of reality.

He himself later said that it seemed to him that a metal pin had pierced his chest, it was so painful. The last thing he remembers is the call to his wife, then he remembered with fragments the way to the emergency room. What Niall doesn't remember at all is the way to the hospital.
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Doctors discovered in the lungs an obstruction of a number of blood vessels, often resulting in death. Doctors believe that the lawyer is lucky because he survived in such a situation. Niall himself thinks so too. But not only because he survived, but because he bought an electric car with autopilot function. In his opinion, it was the autopilot that helped to get to the hospital without any problems, while Nially himself was almost unconscious. He writhed in pain, and the system at that time sent the car to the hospital, and was driving on the highway at a speed of 45 kilometers per hour. The lawyer parked on his own. During the night, doctors brought him to his senses, and in the morning the patient was able to go home.

According to the owner of the electric car, it was Autopilot who saved his life, helping to get to the hospital in automatic mode. Is it really? It is hard to say. But the fact remains that if Niall were driving a regular car, then after the attack the car would have turned into a death projectile: after losing control, the car would have had an accident in which many could have suffered. And so the incident went unnoticed by everyone except the driver. The car continued on its way , as if nothing had happened.

In any case, the story is indicative. And this is not the first time that an electric car and its automatic control system save the driver or pedestrians. In late July, it became known that thanks to the automatic emergency braking system (Automatic Emergency Braking), it was possible to avoid running over a pedestrian. Then the driver of the Tesla Model S was driving with his daughter across Washington, and suddenly a pedestrian in dark clothes appeared in front of him, who jumped right into the middle of the road. The accident did not happen, because the emergency braking system worked, which could recognize the obstacle and stopped the electric car.



The driver decided to report this incident because, in his opinion, there has recently been a lot of news about the problems of the Tesla autopilot, but almost no one talked about situations when Autopilot saved someone’s life. Some incidents could be recorded on video.



Earlier, Ilon Musk said that Tesla autopilot reduces the likelihood of a car in an accident at least twice. Thus, if most of the world’s cars were equipped with such a system, the number of deaths as a result of accidents would have decreased by several hundred thousand a year. At the same time, Tesla has not yet been collecting statistics on the prevention of accidents by its autopilot. According to Mask, the computer system of an electric vehicle quite often takes control of the machine. This helps to reduce the number of accidents, but the company has not yet requested similar data from its customers. The head of Tesla Motors says that he really does not want to ask about such situations, because the client may consider such a request as pressure, interference from his business. Nevertheless, it is known that by the beginning of 2016, the number of cases when the Tesla computer took over control reached several thousand. How many accidents and deaths have been avoided is unknown.

At the end of July , the first results of an investigation of the Tesla electric car accident in May, which killed its driver, 40-year-old American Joshua Brown, were published . As it turned out, the car with the Autopilot feature turned on was driving overspeed. At the time of the collision, the speed was exceeded at 15 km / h and left 119 km / h (74 mph), with the maximum allowed speed on this stretch of road at 104 km / h (65 mph). Earlier, the head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the United States said that the regulator does not plan to impose restrictions on the technology of "virtual assistants" motorist.

A week ago, the Israeli company Mobileye, which is developing the EyeQ3 technology used by the Tesla autopilot, announced its intention to stop cooperating with Tesla Motors. Ilon Mask says that the company knew about the possible termination of the partnership, so this event will not affect the implementation of Tesla plans.