Self Driving Tesla Crashes in Texas Killing Two People
The self driving feature of a Tesla is something that a lot of people are a little skeptical to try out. These guys did and they definitely did not take all of the proper precautions.
So in case you did not know this with Tesla's self driving feature. A warning comes up stating that you should still be paying attention to the road. The Tesla website even states that when you use Autopilot and Full Self Driving capability, "a fully attentive driver, who has their hands on the wheel and is prepared to take over at any moment" should be in the driver's seat.
It looks like over in Spring, Texas on Saturday, a pair of guys went for a cruise with the Full Self Driving Feature of the Tesla on. The vehicle traveled at a high rate of speed around a corner causing the Tesla to crash into a tree. Investigators on the scene say that the two in the vehicle were killed in the crash. One was in the passenger seat, the other was in the backseat.
The other problem that this accident caused was a massive fire. In case you did not know, the Tesla batteries have a tendency to reignite. They need to be put out using special chemicals. Local fire departments on the scene estimated they used around 32,000 gallons of water trying to put out the vehicle's battery.
More and more departments are being trained on how to handle an electric vehicle fire, but sadly not everyone is up to speed. This is the 23rd accident that a self driving Tesla has been in, which compared to how many are on the road is pretty insignificant. It is believed this is the first accident where a driver was not in the driver's seat.
We will if any changes are made in the future to make sure a driver is present in the seat to prevent something like this from happening again.