One of the new features of the Tesla Autopilot since version 8.0 is that the system's radar can now see ahead of the car in front of you and track two cars ahead on the road. By bouncing underneath or around the vehicle in front of you, the radar can sense things that get obstructed from the view by the leading vehicle.
As you can see and hear in the video below, the Tesla Autopilot system registered that the SUV in front of the lead car was braking hard and the system recognized this as a major danger. The Forward Collision Warning send out an audible warning close to two seconds before the lead car slammed into the SUV and activated emergency braking well in time. At first, the driver was shocked that his car started braking heavily from about 110km/h but fractions of a second later it became clear to him why the car did this!
Fortunately, everyone involved in the accident turned out to be OK, there were no serious injuries.
Original video, authorisation from the owner. Essential, no one could predict the accident but the radar did and acted by emergency braking. pic.twitter.com/70MySRiHGR
— Hans Noordsij (@HansNoordsij) 27 december 2016
Via: Electrek and Hans Noordsij