ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL: This Video Of A Terrifying High-Speed Tesla Wreck Is A Reminder That Autopilot’s Problems Aren’t Just Technical.

We’ve written about the hacker/security researcher who goes by GreenTheOnly on Twitter before, as he has done a lot of digging into the data stored in modern cars, with a focus on Teslas. As a result, occasionally salvage yards will send him black boxes and memory modules from cars, which is how he acquired this video and data from a wrecked Tesla. The video shows a pretty harrowing high-speed impact with another car, and while Autopilot was not active right at the time of impact, I think the problems of any Level 2 semi-autonomous systemare involved here.

The crash took place at night, on highway CA-24 near Lafayette, CA, in clear weather. The Tesla (which was recording via its on-board cameras) was driving quite fast and rear-ended a Honda Civic hard enough to send it flying.

There was minimal other traffic around, and the Tesla could have easily passed the Honda on either side. Here, just watch the video:

Found via Small Dead Animals, which filed the link under their recurring “I, For One, Welcome Our New Self-Driving Overlords” category.

As Charles Cooke of NRO noted in 2o17, the war on driving is inevitable: “Autonomous vehicles are about to collide with the American way.” Figuratively, and increasingly likely, literally.