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A digital video disc player was found in the Tesla car that was on autopilot when its driver was killed in a collision with a truck in the US.
Whether the portable DVD player was operating at the time of the crash has not been determined, however, and witnesses who came upon the wreckage of the 2015 Model S sedan gave differing accounts about whether the player was showing a movie.
Questions of why the car did not stop for a turning truck, and whether the victim, Joshua Brown, was watching the road are critical for Tesla Motors. The Palo Alto luxury electric car maker is facing a preliminary inquiry by federal regulators over the safety of the vehicle’s autopilot system that was engaged at the time of the crash in Williston, Florida.
It could be weeks if not months before officials make a final determination of the cause of the incident, the first known fatality of a Model S driver while using Autopilot. Meanwhile, the accident is stoking the debate on whether drivers are being lulled into a false sense of security by such technology.
Brown, 40, of Canton, Ohio, was the lone occupant of the Tesla and was killed in the crash that sheared off the roof of the car. He was a Tesla enthusiast and a former Navy SEAL who ran a technology company, according to his family and his company’s website.
The truck attempted to make a left turn across the eastbound lanes of a highway. The Tesla was travelling east and did not appear to be speeding on the road. But the car never slowed down, and the remainder of the car, without a roof, kept the same speed after going under the trailer.
The Tesla Autopilot system allows the car to keep itself in a lane, maintain speed and operate for a limited time without a driver doing the steering.
Tesla, in a statement , said Autopilot ‘does not turn a Tesla into an autonomous vehicle and does not allow the driver to abdicate responsibility’. Tesla said that the white trailer was not easy for the car’s cameras to distinguish from the bright Florida sky. The crash occurred on a sunny Saturday afternoon.
A Tesla engineer has downloaded the information from the car’s ‘black box’ and shared it with investigators. Officials from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration were alerted by Tesla about the crash.
