A Tesla Model X owner had the vehicle’s Autopilot system engaged when the all-electric SUV crashed on a California highway, Tesla confirmed on Friday while alleging the driver who died in the crash missed key warnings to take control of the car.

Prior to the March 23 collision, Tesla said the Model X owner had Autopilot engaged with adaptive cruise control follow-distance set to a minimum. The driver, Walter Huang, had received “several visual and one audible hands-on warning” earlier in the drive. Huang’s hands weren’t detected on the wheel six seconds prior to the collision, Tesla said. Huang died in the crash.



“The driver had about five seconds and 150 meters of unobstructed view of the concrete divider with the crushed crash attenuator, but the vehicle logs show that no action was taken,” Tesla wrote in a blog post late Friday. 



Tesla said it believes the crash was severe because the “crash attenuator,” a highway safety barrier which is designed to reduce the impact into a concrete lane divider, had been crushed in a prior accident without being replaced.

“We have never seen this level of damage to a Model X in any other crash,” the company said. 



The confirmation that Tesla’s Autopilot system was engaged at the time of the crash comes amid a troubling time for the nascent self-driving car industry. This month, an Uber-owned self-driving car fatally struck a pedestrian, raising significant questions about the safety of automated driving technology. Following the fiery crash involving the Model X driver, the National Transportation Safety Board launched an investigation that’s expected to take months to complete.

The Model X crash is the third known fatality to occur when Autopilot was engaged. In January 2016, 23-year-old Gao Yaning died while driving a Model S on a highway in China, and his family’s attorney recently told Jalopnik that Tesla’s own data confirmed Autopilot was engaged at the time. A half-year later, Joshua Brown died in Florida after his Model S crashed into a truck. The NTSB said an over-reliance on Autopilot was partly to blame in that crash.

Tesla has been quick to post updates on the Model X crash in recent days, saying late Friday that it has been “working as quickly as possible to establish the facts of last week’s accident.”

“Our hearts are with the family and friends who have been affected by this tragedy,” the company said.

The NTSB initially said it wasn’t clear if Autopilot was engaged at the time it sent investigators to the scene earlier this week.

But the confirmation that Autopilot was on should only add more questions for an industry currently trying to untangle how to approach self-driving cars in wake of this month’s fatal Uber crash, the first known to involve a pedestrian and an autonomous car.

Update, March 31, 9:50 a.m.: This post has been updated to include more information about previous fatal crashes that occurred when Autopilot was engaged. </s> Tesla Inc has said that a Tesla Model X involved a fatal crash in California last week had activated its Autopilot system, raising new questions about the semi-autonomous system that handles some driving tasks.

Tesla also said vehicle logs from the accident showed no action had been taken by the driver soon before the crash and that he had received earlier warnings to put his hands on the wheel.

"The driver had about five seconds and 150 meters of unobstructed view of the concrete divider with the crushed crash attenuator, but the vehicle logs show that no action was taken," Tesla said.

The statement did not say why the Autopilot system apparently did not detect the concrete divider.

The fatal crash and vehicle fire of the Tesla near Mountain View, California, involved two other cars and delayed traffic for hours. The 38-year-old Tesla driver died at a nearby hospital shortly after the crash.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which launched an investigation into the crash earlier this week, did not immediately comment late Friday. The National Transportation Safety Board is also investigating the fatal crash.

Autopilot allows drivers to take their hands off the wheel for extended periods under certain conditions. Tesla requires users to agree to keep their hands on the wheel “at all times” before they can use autopilot, but users routinely tout the fact they can use the system to drive hands-free.

In September, NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said operational limitations in the Tesla Model S played a major role in a May 2016 crash that killed a driver using autopilot.

That death -- the first fatality in a Tesla vehicle operating in Autopilot mode -- raised questions about the safety of systems that can perform driving tasks for long stretches with little or no human intervention, but which cannot completely replace human drivers.

The NTSB said Tesla could have taken further steps to prevent the system’s misuse, and faulted the driver for not paying attention and for "overreliance on vehicle automation."

In January, NHTSA and NTSB launched investigations into a Tesla vehicle, apparently traveling in semi-autonomous mode, that struck a fire truck in California. Neither agency nor Tesla has offered any update.

The government probes raise the risk for Tesla and automakers at a time when the industry is seeking federal legislation that would ease deployment of self driving cars.

The crash comes soon after an Uber vehicle in Arizona in self-driving mode struck and killed a pedestrian in the first death linked to an autonomous vehicle.

Tesla said late Friday that "Autopilot does not prevent all accidents – such a standard would be impossible – but it makes them much less likely to occur. It unequivocally makes the world safer for the vehicle occupants, pedestrians and cyclists."

Tesla said that in the United States "there is one automotive fatality every 86 million miles across all vehicles from all manufacturers. For Tesla, there is one fatality, including known pedestrian fatalities, every 320 million miles in vehicles equipped with Autopilot hardware."

Tesla in September 2016 unveiled improvements to Autopilot, adding new limits on hands-off driving.

On Thursday, Tesla said it was recalling 123,000 Model S sedans built before April 2016 in order to replace bolts in the power steering component that can begin to corrode after contact in cold temperatures with road salt. No accidents or injuries were reported. </s> • A Tesla Model X destroyed in a fiery crash that also killed the driver had been operating on Autopilot moments before the collision, Tesla announced on Friday night, citing information collected from vehicle logs.
• The company said the driver had set a distance-control feature that determines how much space the Model X keeps between itself and other vehicles to the "minimum" setting.
• Tesla also asserts that the driver had received "several visual and one audible hands-on warning," and their hands were not detected on the wheel "six seconds prior to the collision."

Tesla revealed new information about a collision involving a Model X, in which the driver of the electric SUV was killed last week.

The company said in a blog post on Friday night that the Model X had been operating on Autopilot, its semi-autonomous driving system, before the crash, according to data obtained from onboard vehicle logs. The driver had also set a distance-control feature that determines how much space the Model X keeps between itself and other vehicles to the "minimum" setting, the company said.

According to Tesla, the driver had received "several visual and one audible hands-on warning" during the drive, and their hands were not detected on the steering wheel "six seconds prior to the collision."

The Model X slammed into a highway barrier in the Northern California city of Mountain View on March 23. The driver later died at a hospital.

Tesla said the driver "had about five seconds and 150 meters of unobstructed view of the concrete divider with the crushed crash attenuator, but the vehicle logs show that no action was taken."

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is investigating. Two other vehicles were involved in the collision.

It is the second collision involving a Tesla operating on Autopilot that the NTSB has investigated so far this year. The agency was also looking into a Model S sedan that collided with a fire truck in the Los Angeles suburb of Culver City in January.

Tesla has said that "Autopilot is not a fully self-driving technology and drivers need to remain attentive at all times."

The Autopilot system is designed to warn drivers whenever it detects that the driver's hands are not on the wheel. The severity of those alerts gradually escalates if the driver does not respond. The Autopilot system eventually deactivates itself if the driver ignores the warnings. </s> Tesla Inc said on Friday that vehicle logs from last week's fatal accident of a Tesla Model X in California showed that the autopilot had been engaged prior to the crash.

Tesla said that the autopilot was on with adaptive cruise control follow-distance set to minimum.

The company also said no action had been taken by the driver, who had a 5-second view of the concrete divider.

"The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive and the driver's hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision," Tesla said.

The fatal crash and vehicle fire of the Tesla Model X near Mountain View, California, last week involved two other cars. Tesla vehicles have a system called Autopilot that handles some driving tasks.

The 38-year-old Tesla driver died at a nearby hospital shortly after the crash. </s> Image copyright Reuters Image caption The driver of the Tesla Model X died shortly after the crash

Electric carmaker Tesla says a vehicle involved in a fatal crash in California was in Autopilot mode, raising further questions about the safety of self-driving technology.

One of the company's Model X cars crashed into a roadside barrier and caught fire on 23 March.

Tesla says Autopilot was engaged at the time of the accident involving the driver, 38, who died soon afterwards.

But they did not say whether the system had detected the concrete barrier.

"The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive," a statement on the company's website said.

"The driver's hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision."

"The driver had about five seconds and 150m (490ft) of unobstructed view of the concrete divider... but the vehicle logs show that no action was taken," the statement added.

Tesla's Autopilot system does some of the things a fully autonomous machine can do. It can brake, accelerate and steer by itself under certain conditions, but it is classified as a driver assistance system, is not intended to operate independently and as such the driver is meant to have their hands on the wheel at all times.

In 2016, a Tesla driver was killed in Florida when his car failed to spot a lorry crossing its path.

It led the company to introduce new safety measures, including turning off Autopilot and bringing the car to a halt if the driver lets go of the wheel for too long.

Federal investigators said last year that Tesla "lacked understanding" of the semi-autonomous Autopilot's limitations.

Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Uber dashcam footage shows moment before fatal impact

The accident in California comes at a difficult time for self-driving technology.

Earlier this month, Uber was forbidden from resuming self-driving tests in the US state of Arizona.

It followed a fatal crash in the state in which an autonomous vehicle hit a woman who was walking her bike across the road.

It was thought to be the first time an autonomous car had been involved in a fatal collision with a pedestrian.

The company suspended all self-driving tests in North America after the accident. </s> DETROIT — Federal safety investigators have booted electric car maker Tesla Inc. from the group investigating a fatal crash in California that involved an SUV operating with the company’s Autopilot system.

The National Transportation Safety Board said Thursday it removed Tesla as a party to the investigation after the company prematurely made information public.

“Tesla violated the party agreement by releasing investigative information before it was vetted and confirmed by the NTSB,” the agency said in a statement. “Such releases of incomplete information often lead to speculation and incorrect assumptions about the probable cause of a crash.”

On Thursday afternoon, Tesla issued a statement claiming that it withdrew from the agreement two days earlier after being told that it would be removed if it made additional statements before the NTSB finished its probe in the next 12 to 24 months.

The company said it released information on the crash to correct “misleading” claims being made about Autopilot creating safety problems. Tesla said it would file a complaint with Congress and accused the agency of being more concerned with “press headlines” than promoting safety.

Removing a party to an investigation is rare but has happened in the past, according to the agency. Companies and other organizations can become parties in a probe because they can give technical help and share sensitive information.

The move means that the NTSB and Tesla will no longer share information about the March 23 crash of a Tesla Model X SUV on U.S. 101 near Mountain View in Silicon Valley. The driver, Walter Huang, 38, a software engineer for Apple, was killed in the crash.

In a statement on March 30, Tesla confirmed that the semi-autonomous Autopilot system was operating at the time of the crash and seemed to blame the crash on Huang. The company said Huang didn’t have his hands on the steering wheel for six seconds before the impact and also received several warnings from the vehicle.

Shortly after Tesla released the information, NTSB spokesman Christopher O’Neil said the agency was “unhappy” about the disclosure.

Tesla tells drivers that its Autopilot system, which uses cameras, radar and computers to keep speed, change lanes, self-park and automatically stop vehicles, requires drivers to keep their eyes on the road and hands on the wheel in order to take control to avoid accidents.

The Palo Alto, California, company said its vehicle logs showed Huang took no action to stop the Model X from crashing into a concrete lane divider. Photographs of the SUV show that the front of the vehicle was demolished; its hood was ripped off; and its front wheels were scattered on the freeway.

The vehicle also caught fire, though Tesla said no one was in the vehicle when that happened. The company said the crash was made worse by a missing or damaged safety shield on the end of the lane divider that is supposed to help shield cars from any impact.

The NTSB, along with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, are looking into the crash, as well as another Tesla crash in January near Los Angeles in which a Model S sedan smashed into a fire truck parked on a freeway.

Tesla would not say whether the Model S in that crash was operating on Autopilot.

In the crash that killed Huang, a Tesla spokeswoman would not directly answer questions about why the SUV didn’t spot the barrier and stop before the collision.

The spokeswoman referred to a statement saying that Tesla owner’s manuals have warnings and notifications stating that a driver should not depend on the car’s autosteer system to pick the right driving path. It also says automatic emergency braking “is not designed to avoid a collision and is not a substitute for maintaining a safe travelling distance between you and the vehicle in front of you.”

In its statement Thursday, Tesla says there is one auto death in the U.S. for every 86 million miles driven, but for Tesla vehicles, it’s only one death for every 320 million miles.

The company also accused the NTSB of focusing on the “safest cars in America” while ignoring less-safe vehicles. </s> Federal investigators say they have booted electric car maker Tesla Inc. from a group that’s investigating a fatal crash in California that involved an SUV using the company’s Autopilot system.

DETROIT — Federal investigators say they have booted electric car maker Tesla Inc. from a group that’s investigating a fatal crash in California that involved an SUV using the company’s Autopilot system.

The National Transportation Safety Board said it removed Tesla as a party to the investigation after the company prematurely made information public.

“Tesla violated the party agreement by releasing investigative information before it was vetted and confirmed by the NTSB,” the agency said in a statement. “Such releases of incomplete information often lead to speculation and incorrect assumptions about the probable cause of a crash.”

Tesla, however, disputed the claim and said it withdrew from the agreement two days earlier, after being told that it would be removed if it made additional statements before the NTSB finished its probe in the next 12 to 24 months.

The company said it released information to correct “misleading” claims being made about Autopilot creating safety problems. In a statement about the escalating dispute, Tesla said it would file a complaint with Congress and accused the NTSB of being more concerned with “press headlines” than promoting safety.

Removing a party to an investigation is rare but has happened in the past, according to the agency. Companies and other organizations can become parties in a probe because they can give technical help and share sensitive information.

The move means that the NTSB will no longer share information about the March 23 crash of a Tesla Model X SUV on U.S. 101 near Mountain View in Silicon Valley. The driver, Walter Huang, 38, a software engineer for Apple, was killed in the crash.

In a statement on March 30, Tesla confirmed that the semi-autonomous Autopilot system was operating at the time of the crash and seemed to blame the crash on Huang. The company said Huang didn’t have his hands on the steering wheel for six seconds before the impact and also received several warnings from the vehicle.

Shortly after Tesla released the information, an NTSB spokesman said the agency was “unhappy” about the disclosure.

Tesla tells drivers that its Autopilot system — which uses cameras, radar and computers to keep speed, change lanes and automatically stop vehicles — requires drivers to keep their eyes on the road and hands on the wheel in order to take control to avoid accidents.

The Palo Alto, California, company said its vehicle logs showed Huang took no action to stop the Model X from crashing into a concrete lane divider. The company said the crash was worsened by a missing or damaged safety shield on the end of the lane divider.

The NTSB, along with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, is looking into the crash, as well as another Tesla crash in January near Los Angeles in which a Model S sedan smashed into a firetruck parked on a freeway. Tesla would not say whether the Model S in that crash was operating on Autopilot.

David Friedman, a former NHTSA acting administrator who now is director of cars and product policy for Consumers Union, the advocacy arm of Consumer Reports, said the Tesla-NTSB spat could delay the investigation if the agency doesn’t have all the electronic information it needs from the company. The agency has legal options if Tesla isn’t forthcoming, he said, but those take time and taxpayer dollars.

The NTSB, he said, has never been focused on publicity, and it has the authority to investigate new technology like Autopilot. “If anything, the NTSB is shining a spotlight on Tesla because of their innovation,” Friedman said.

Consumers Union has called for Tesla to stop testing the cars with its buyers, and Friedman said the company shouldn’t use the name Autopilot because it implies that the cars can drive themselves.

“You should name it so that it is clear what it can and can’t do,” he said.

In the crash that killed Huang, a Tesla spokeswoman would not directly answer questions about why the SUV didn’t spot the freeway barrier and stop before the collision.

The spokeswoman referred to a statement saying that Tesla owners’ manuals have warnings and notifications stating that a driver should not depend on the car’s autosteer system to pick the right driving path. It also says automatic emergency braking “is not designed to avoid a collision and is not a substitute for maintaining a safe traveling distance” from other vehicles.

In its statement Thursday, Tesla accused the NTSB of focusing on the “safest cars in America” while ignoring less-safe vehicles. Tesla says there is one auto death in the U.S. for every 86 million miles driven, but for Tesla vehicles, it’s one death for every 320 million miles.

The NTSB makes recommendations to prevent crashes, while NHTSA has authority to fine automakers, push for recalls and seek regulations. </s> The family of a man who was killed in a fiery crash involving a Tesla Model X vehicle plans to file a wrongful death lawsuit against the car company over allegations of a faulty Autopilot system, according to an announcement by a legal firm representing the family.

San Mateo resident Walter Huang, 38, suffered major injuries and later died after his 2017 Tesla collided with a median on Highway 101 in Mountain View on March 23. Vehicle logs recovered by Tesla showed that Huang had been using the vehicle's Autopilot function at the time of the crash, when the vehicle hit a cement barrier between Highway 101 and the Highway 85 carpool flyover, according to the company.

In an online post Wednesday, the law firm Minami Tamaki stated that the family intends to file the wrongful death suit against Tesla, and could potentially extend the suit to any subcontractors involved in the design and construction of the Autopilot system. An early review by the law firm indicated that the Autopilot system installed in the Model X may have misread painted lanes on the roadway, failed to detect the concrete median and failed to brake the car, according to the post.

"The firm believes Tesla's Autopilot feature is defective and likely caused Huang’s death, despite Tesla’s apparent attempt to blame the victim of this terrible tragedy," the law firm said in a statement.

The company lists grounds for the suit including liability, defective product design, and intentional and negligent misrepresentation.

In a blog post last month, Tesla officials said the company reviewed the crash and found that Huang had Autopilot engaged in the moments before the crash, and that he had ignored "several visual" and one audible warning to take the wheel again. The vehicle did not detect Huang's hands on the steering wheel during the six seconds prior to the collision, according to the blog post, and he had "about five seconds and 150 meters of unobstructed view of the concrete divider."

Tesla doubled down on the argument that Huang was largely at fault for the crash, noting that the "only way for this accident to have occurred is if Mr. Huang was not paying attention to the road, despite the car providing multiple warnings to do so."

"The fundamental premise of both moral and legal liability is a broken promise, and there was none here," according to the statement issued to media outlets Wednesday. "Tesla is extremely clear that Autopilot requires the driver to be alert and have hands on the wheel. This reminder is made every single time Autopilot is engaged."

In the weeks following the crash, Tesla officials have emphasized the strong safety track record of the company's Autopilot technology, citing statistics showing that crashes are far less likely to occur when Autopilot is active. The company cites statistics gathered by a federal traffic safety agency showing that the first iteration of Autopilot, released a year ago, reduced crash rates by about 40 percent, and argues that the technology has only gotten better since then.

"The reason that other families are not on TV is because their loved ones are still alive," Tesla officials said in the statement.

Both Tesla and the aggrieved family have also pinned blame on Caltrans for allegedly failing to maintain a safety guard, known as an attenuator barrier, at the location of the crash that could have reduced the impact of the crash. Tesla officials claimed, shortly after the accident, that the barrier had "either been removed or crushed" in a prior accident and had not been replaced. The Minami Tamaki law firm also said the family "may" file a lawsuit against the California Department of Transportation for what it calls dangerous conditions of public property. </s> A U.S. agency said Tuesday it has sent investigators to look into a fatal crash and fire on a California highway that involved a Tesla electric SUV equipped with a semi-autonomous control system.

The National Transportation Safety Board said on Twitter that it's not clear whether the Tesla Model X was operating on its Autopilot program at the time of the crash.

The feature is designed to keep a vehicle centered in its lane at a set distance from cars in front of it and also can change lanes and brake automatically.

The driver of the Tesla, a 38-year-old man from San Mateo, California, was killed in the crash last week on U.S. 101 in Silicon Valley, California Highway Patrol spokesman Art Montiel said.

Photographs taken of the SUV show the front of the vehicle was obliterated. Its hood was ripped off and its front wheels were strewn on the freeway.

The vehicle was traveling southbound at "freeway speed" when it hit a freeway barrier, causing a collision with two other cars whose drivers were not reported injured, Montiel said.

"For unknown reasons the Tesla caught fire," Montiel said.

Palo Alto, California-based Tesla Motors wouldn't say if Autopilot was working at the time of the crash. It said in a statement Tuesday that it was deeply saddened by the crash and is cooperating with authorities.

The investigation is the latest by federal authorities into a crash involving a Tesla vehicle.

In January, the NTSB and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration dispatched teams to Culver City, near Los Angeles, to investigate the crash of a Model S electric car that may have been operating under the Autopilot system.

The investigations come as Congress and federal agencies grapple with how to regulate autonomous vehicles and those with systems that are partially self-driving.

Tesla has taken steps to prevent drivers from using Autopilot improperly, including measuring the amount of torque applied to the steering wheel and sending visual and audio warnings.

If the warnings are ignored, drivers would be prevented from using Autopilot, the company said.
U.S.-based automobile manufacturer Tesla confirms that one of their Model X cars was placed into Autopilot mode moments before a fatal crash in California, United States. Tesla's Autopilot system is not intended to operate independently and as such the driver is meant to have their hands on the wheel at all times. The recorder of the system logged that the driver did not have their hands on the wheel at the time of the crash.