Newly shared information from a Tesla engineer gives us a rare look into how the Autopilot feature in Tesla cars works and what happened during a deadly car crash in California in 2018.
Tesla is going to court on Tuesday because of a lawsuit filed by the family of Walter Huang. He was an engineer at Apple who died in March 2018 when his Tesla Model X crashed into a safety barrier on a highway in California.
The family says that Tesla misled people about how safe the Autopilot system in its cars is and that they knew it had problems.
In July 2023, lawyers for Huang’s family talked to Akshay Phatak, a Tesla engineer, to learn more about how the Autopilot system works. The Washington Post got a hold of the conversation.
Phatak told the lawyers that the car uses marked lanes on the highway to steer itself. This is similar to the lane departure warning systems in other cars. But Tesla calls it part of its advanced “Autopilot” system.
“If there are clear lines on the road, the car will follow them,” Phatak said. He also said that Tesla’s system was made to follow the lines on the highway.
According to Huang’s family’s lawyers, Huang was driving with Autopilot on when his car went into an area where the highway and an exit ramp met. They say that the Autopilot made the car turn left, out of the lane it should have been in, and hit a concrete barrier.
The Post said that the car started drifting because the lane markings on the highway were fading. Then it found a clearer marking on the left and went straight for the barrier.
Tesla hasn’t said anything about this yet.
Tesla’s main defense is that Huang wasn’t paying attention. Tesla’s lawyers said that if he was watching the road, he could have avoided the crash.
Tesla’s lawyers also want to show evidence from an engineer at Apple who says that Huang was using his phone before the crash.
Before, the National Transportation Safety Board said that there wasn’t just one reason for the crash. They said that Tesla’s Autopilot had limits and that the car didn’t do a good job of making sure the driver was paying attention.
Phatak also said that as long as the car’s cameras can see lines on the road, the Autopilot will work.
The Post said before that Tesla’s Autopilot sometimes works on roads where it shouldn’t be used.
Lawyers for Huang’s family didn’t say anything about this yet.
