Tesla driver apparently caught sleeping at the wheel going 60 mph

The driver of a Tesla on autopilot appeared to be asleep behind the wheel while whizzing along a Massachusetts highway, new video shows.

A fellow motorist captured the driver with his head slumped forward — and his passenger equally zonked out — along I-90 on Sunday.

“Some guy literally asleep at the wheel on the Mass Pike (great place for it),” tweeted fellow motorist Dakota Randall with the clip. “Teslas are sick, I guess?”

Randall guessed he and the Tesla were both going about 60 mph through Newton at the time. He said he tried to wake up the daredevil drivers by honking — but “it didn’t work at all,” he told NBC10 Boston.

“I kind of looked over and saw what I thought was somebody asleep at the wheel and I was like that can’t be right, so I did a double-take, looked over and sure enough this guy was just, head between his legs completely asleep,” Randall told the network.

While the autopilot system features advanced safety features, Tesla takes pains to stress that it is “not a self-driving system.”

Autopilot is intended for use with a fully attentive driver, who has their hands on the wheel and is prepared to take over at any time,” the company states on its website.

Randall said he’ll always watch out for Teslas on the road.

“I’m always going to look to see if somebody’s asleep,” he said.

State police told NBC10 Boston they were aware of the incident from media reports but had not been contacted by anyone.

In June, another Tesla driver was similarly caught snoozing behind the wheel in the San Francisco Bay Area.

In a statement, the company implied the video was a hoax and claimed it’s cars would not allow users to fall asleep at the wheel.

“Many of these videos appear to be dangerous pranks or hoaxes. Our driver-monitoring system repeatedly reminds drivers to remain engaged and prohibits the use of Autopilot when warnings are ignored. At highway speeds, drivers typically receive warnings every 30 seconds or less if their hands aren’t detected on the wheel,” the company said.

“Tesla owners have driven billions of miles using Autopilot, and data from our quarterly Vehicle Safety Report indicates that drivers using Autopilot experience fewer accidents than those operating without assistance.”

via: https://nypost.com/2019/09/09/tesla-driver-apparently-caught-sleeping-at-the-wheel-going-60-mph/

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