Tesla Model X Was On AutoPilot Before Crash, Company Confirms

Tesla said that the 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. According to the company, moments before the collision, Autopilot was engaged with the adaptive cruise control follow-distance set to minimum. 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.

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"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 statement said.

The reason for the crash, according to Tesla, was so 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," a spokesperson said.

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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."

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.