(Photo by Connecticut State Police/Facebook)
There's fresh concerns over the safety of Tesla's Autopilot system this week after it was reported a Model 3 managed to collide with a parked police car.
As CNBC reports, on Saturday morning a police car pulled up behind a disabled vehicle in the northbound left center lane of I-95 in Norwalk. The trooper had left his cruiser's emergency lights activated and was waiting with the driver of the disabled vehicle for a tow truck to arrive. A 2018 Tesla Model 3 with the license plate "MODEL3" then drove into the back of the police car before also striking the disabled vehicle.
As the Connecticut State Police Facebook post confirms, the driver of the Model 3 stated that he had activated Autopilot and at the time of the incident was "checking on his dog which was in the back seat." As you'd expect, the driver has been issued a misdemeanor summons for Reckless Driving and Reckless Endangerment and he's lucky nobody was injured during the collision.
Tesla does clearly state that Autopilot still requires the driver actively supervise the vehicle, but even so, the vehicle should automatically take evasive action and/or stop if it senses a collision is imminent. For some reason this Model 3 didn't detect the danger and Tesla will no doubt investigate why. Could it be that the cruiser's flashing lights confused the sensors?
The Connecticut State Police ends its Facebook post about the incident by reminding everyone, "According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, although a number of vehicles have some automated capabilities, there are no vehicles currently for sale that are fully automated or self-driving." It seems unlikely there will be for quite some time if this is the best vehicle manufacturers can achieve right now.