The video was first published on Reddit’s r/flying subreddit, where the jet with the distinctive-looking V-shaped tail was identified as a Cirrus Vision SF50, which sells for around $2 million and has been compared to a flying Tesla, ironically. The video also showed up on Twitter:
— waffle party planner (@Phylan) April 22, 2022 The incident seems to have happened at a Cirrus trade show, though that hasn’t been confirmed. (We really don’t have a lot of information on this video, though we’re looking).What is clear is that it did happen at an airport, and the Tesla Model Y, which appears to be un-crewed and un-passengered, slowly and deliberately drives right into the side of the plane, just behind the wings, and keeps pushing it, spinning the plane around by about 90° before stopping. It’s not clear how much damage happened to either plane or car; the speeds were very low, so it’s possible damage is minimal. More alarming is that the Tesla did not appear to have any idea it was about to hit a very noticeable private jet just sitting right there. Teslas do have cameras on the upper part of the windshield, in front of the rear view mirror assembly, so one would think the plane would have been visible as some sort of obstacle to the car’s self-driving system. Granted, a small airplane isn’t a common thing for drivers to encounter, though it should at least read as a large, immobile object that’s best not driven into. Even if the classification system was stymied in this instance, that doesn’t really excuse not just stopping. There are no impact sensors or ultrasonic sensor on the upper part of the body where the car contacted the plane, so that could be why the Model Y was so gleefully unaware it was shoving a plane around. Regardless, this incident doesn’t make the Smart Summon system seem particularly, you know, good. At the same time, I’m fairly sure the Smart Summon feature requires a user to hold a button on a mobile app; did someone just hold the button down as the car rammed into a jet? It all seems a bit odd. Tesla, having no PR department, hasn’t bothered to comment on the story, though Elon Musk himself once referred to the Smart Summon feature as a “fun trick”:
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 17, 2021 I can’t say I disagree; watching that car slowly shove that private jet around was pretty fun! And yes, hopefully most of the deplorables stayed behind on familiar turf. Is it not programmed to avoid tree branches or signs that may be at that height? What about the front of a gooseneck trailer that may be sitting in a parking lot? What if I have the engine out of one of my project cars just suspended on a hoist, is a Tesla just going to randomly drive into it because Elon didn’t think to program it to avoid ICE that may be dangling from a chain? That being said, that Musk tweet describing Self Summon as a “fun trick” and implying it’s really not very useful at this time…..at least that’s got a ring of honesty about it. Forget FSD, most owners would probably just settle for a properly functioning adaptive cruise control right about now. This is just the latest example of Tesla selling potentially dangerous software to gain real world AI experience at the expense of public safety while all the NHTSA can do is try to play catch up after the fact. Jan 2022 Elon Musk Promises Full Self-Driving Teslas in 2022. “Being safer than a human is a low standard, not a high standard.” Feb 2022 53,822 Tesla’s under recall, NHSTA ordering roll back a self-driving feature that caused the company’s cars to break the law. “Rolling Stop Feature”. -Tesla under investigation for “Phantom Braking”, 416,000 vehicles affected, in the complaints owners say they’ve nearly been rear-ended after their vehicles brake unexpectedly. While Elon Musk said “there were no safety issues,” federal regulators disagree. March 2022 Tesla fired an employee after he posted driverless tech reviews on YouTube. He says he never showed unreleased products or company secrets, but some of his videos showed the system not working perfectly. April 2022 Musk promises robotaxis by 2024 April 2022 Tesla Q1 Shareholder Meeting: “With respect to full-self driving, of any technology development I’ve ever been involved in, I’ve never really seen more kind of false dawns where it seems like we’re going to break through but we don’t.” He encouraged people to join Tesla’s FSD Beta program, which requires owners to buy or subscribe to Tesla’s FSD driver assistance package that costs owners $12,000. “So that’s my recommendation, is join the full self-driving beta program, and experience it for yourself.”
