Google Is Not Elmo’s Friend

Where are the competent journalists? pic.twitter.com/l4UjdxxnXH

— Whole Mars Catalog (@WholeMarsBlog) February 9, 2023

You just fired your lead engineer because you somehow thought your own company shadowbanned you. Maybe it’s time to rethink life decisions?

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) February 10, 2023

So I was interested in this because the crash in question happened here in Houston, and initial police reports were that both occupants of the car were in the back seat. The NTSB report is quite conclusive that not only was that (partially) incorrect, but the “auto-pilot” feature wouldn’t have operated at all under the conditions. 

The driver was drunk (this was already known) and accelerated away from his driveway at 67 mph. Then he drove into a tree, where the car caught fire and couldn’t be extinguished. That’s one of the points Elmo fails to mention.

The report also recommends that manufacturers of electric cars provide details on how to put out the fire if this happens again.

I wonder if Tesla is planning to do that; although I imagine “How To Extinguish A Flaming Tesla” is not a document Elmo & Co. want at large in the world.

There’s also another thing. From the Reuters article Whole Mars blog cited, there was this:

The NTSB said "the available evidence suggests that the driver was seated in the driver’s seat at the time of the crash and moved into the rear seat" and added "it was not possible to determine whether the doors were manually operational following the power loss."

Yeah. I wouldn’t get into a Tesla on a bet.