The recordings are probably another case of “how can you drive like that?” Wrote the well-known Tesla driver and hacker @greentheonly on Twitter on Thursday and posted a video that is described very cautiously with his comment: In it A Tesla Model X races on a freeway at far excessive speed into a compact Honda that is driving in the same lane in front of it. In addition, the hacker provided exact data on the serious accident, which he took from records of the destroyed Tesla.
No reports of Tesla crashes
According to @greentheonly, the accident happened this January in the US state of California. It was initially unclear whether people were harmed. The hacker himself and others hoped that there were at least no serious injuries because there were no reports of the crash to be found.
However, the question of where the material comes from has been clarified: Sometimes he gets computers from accident Teslas sent from scrap yards, @greentheonly explained. Their operators are only human and want to know what happened to them. Apparently, even some scrap dealers know that Tesla’s electric cars carry a lot of data. By the way, older Tesla hardware can no longer be sold – that from Model X is generation 2.5 and is now “worthless”.
Ugh, another one for the “who drives like that?” book I guess.
Looks like poor Honda went airborne but I don’t see any news for that date/location so hopefully nobody died or was seriously hurt.
Speed at impact unknown yet (no canbus data)#TeslaCrashFootage pic.twitter.com/dpT8QSiR5Q— green (@greentheonly) November 12, 2020
Initially, @greentheonly only posted on Twitter the video that the Model X’s front camera captured in the seconds before impact. It takes place on a nocturnal, dry highway with four lanes and little traffic. The Tesla is noticeably fast and overtakes another car on the right (allowed in the USA). Soon afterwards, he approached the Honda with apparently increasing speed. The Tesla Model X crashes into the rear of the car without any recognizable attempt to brake or evasive, and the compact car lifts off to the front left before the video goes almost black.
Impact speed 220 km / h
The Tesla hacker later also provided the data on the serious accident, which he gradually extracted from the “black box” in the Model X’s computer. Accordingly, the speed of the heavy electric car on impact was 136.55 miles per hour, almost exactly 220 kilometers per hour and thus well above the limit in all US states; the difference to the speed of the Honda in the same lane was 101.4 kilometers per hour.
Got some help with the blackbox. Here’s the speed leading to accident.
Impact time ground speed: 136.55MPH
you can see the drop in speed at impact is smallish – likely due to “lightweight” Honda pushed out to much faster speed (100+mph?) pic.twitter.com/Z0OOgTV4mv
— green (@greentheonly) November 12, 2020
The data published by @greentheonly also show that at least the autopilot function of the adaptive cruise control was deactivated around 40 seconds before the impact with an obstacle warning; there was also a collision alarm shortly beforehand, but the power pedal remained firmly pressed. There was initially a lack of clarity with regard to the automatic steering. According to the Twitter comments, this autosteer function will not remain active above 90 mph. Instead, Emergency Lane Correction, which is on by default, could have prevented the Model X from getting off the lane with a possibly unconscious driver before the crash.
The Tesla hacker himself did not dare to say anything about the possible background of the accident. He thought it was too strange for a driver who had fallen asleep or was unconscious, at least an insurance company had not asked him about the material, he just wrote. And so the exact events surrounding the serious crash, which, given the lack of reports and investigations, presumably ended without fatalities, may remain unexplained in the long run, despite all the Tesla data and videos.
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