Elon Musk's vision of a world where humans are no longer required to keep their hands on the wheel when on the road has hit another snag. The NHTSA has launched a new probe into the safety of Tesla's FSD system after a series of troubling incidents.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration investigation centers around four accidents where Teslas running the Full Self-Driving (FSD) beta crashed after entering areas of reduced visibility like sun glare, fog, or dust clouds. One of those crashes ended in a pedestrian fatality, while another resulted in injuries.
The NHTSA wishes to
examine whether FSD can "detect and respond appropriately" when visibility is poor. They'll also check whether any similar low-visibility crashes have occurred and scrutinize any updates Tesla has made to the system or its claimed safety benefits. The skepticism is understandable.
The FSD system relies solely on cameras without a stereoscopic setup, which is different from Waymo's setup, which
combines camera, lidar, and radar hardware. Additionally, thanks to Tesla's decision to allow the beta software on older models with less advanced hardware, hundreds of thousands of cars are running FSD despite having inferior sensors.
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