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Comment by jquery | Hacker News Reader

The fact that the NTSB is investigating is comforting. We're moving crashes from the domain of "shit happens" to more systematic "autopilot system X suffered Y deficiency", more analogous to the investigation of plane crashes. I'm hopeful to see the number of car fatalities sharply drop over the next 20 years as autopilots improve.

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Yes. Here's the actual NTSB abstract.[1] The full report isn't out yet. Main recommendation:

To manufacturers of vehicles equipped with Level 2 vehicle automation systems (Audi of America, BMW of North America, Infiniti USA, Mercedes-Benz USA, Tesla Inc., and VolvoCar USA):

5. Incorporate system safeguards that limit the use of automated vehicle control systems to those conditions for which they were designed.

6. Develop applications to more effectively sense the driver’s level of engagement and alert the driver when engagement is lacking while automated vehicle control systems are in use.

The NTSB points out that the recorded data from automatic driving systems needs to be recoverable after a crash without manufacturer involvement. For plane crashes, the NTSB gets the "black boxes" (which are orange) and reads them out at an NTSB facility. They want that capability for self-driving cars.

[1] https://www.ntsb.gov/news/events/Documents/2017-HWY16FH018-B...

That's really reassuring. Constructive and thoughtful recommendations. Even though this government agency is in a country I do not live in, I feel better about autopilot systems from reading how this is being addressed over in the USA.

The NTSB and most of other highly developed nations ' equivalents really are quite amazing. For whatever reason, I read most of the full NTSB aviation incident reports. Aside from the thoroughness of them and the engineering geekery, they are truly master classes in understanding how to do a proper postmortem.

The NTSB's ability to remain apolitical and engineering-focused is really remarkable. They way they were portrayed in "Sully" is shameful and was uncalled for.

You might be thinking of the investigation of commercial air carrier crashes. In general aviation (loosely "light aircraft") crashes, there are still a great many of them closed with "pilot lost control of aircraft for undetermined reasons" and "NTSB staff did not travel as part of the investigation but relied on other agencies who had personnel on the ground".

I have huge trust in the NTSB, both from a public good perspective, and from a standpoint of their competency to examine incidents. They also seem to be pretty open with how even the smallest incidents they investigate have demonstration videos and findings made public.

Their involvement can only be a positive in the self-driving car industry

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