I know nothing about aviation, but isn’t “autopilot” on a commercial plane pretty much just “maintain altitude and heading”? Pilots still have to be engaged and active, right?
The driver is licensed to operate the motor vehicle. It is their responsibility to be familiar with the safe operation of the vehicle.
> how to handle autopilot and its common errors and how to correct them?
Do you believe that anything additional was required here other than keeping the car in it's lane?
Also, note that the beep is the driver taking over from autopilot.
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/teslamotors/comments/8a0jfh/autopil...
But blaming this on the use of the term "Autopilot" is idiotic and discussion centering around it is silly when there are much more important questions to answer about the design of autopilot, other driver assistance systems, and the future of self-driving cars.
99% invisible has a really interesting story about this topic: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/children-of-the-magen...
Airplane autopilots really are solving a much simpler problem than even a level 3 autonomous car has to solve.
The most advanced autopilots can automatically takeoff and land, but that requires substantial ground equipment at each airport to support.
You say that it would take a massive investment but realistically existing signage, reflectors, and road markings probably cost more than the equivalent for an autonomous vehicle would.
The exciting thing about self-driving cars this time was that they worked on existing roads, making them financially feasible.
Perhaps final stages of ILS approach? That'd be the exception, but pilots are trained and certified for this - and definitely not allowed to snooze off then.
(I'm not a pilot, but have spent a fair amount of time and money on various PC flight sims; edit: and used to drive a Mazda 3 with a very good radar cruise control and AEB, before ditching it for a bicycle because getting old and fat).
GA autopilots may be more limited, but that’s not what the general public is thinking of when you say autopilot.
This is far from a defense of Tesla. On the contrary, the public's ignorance about what capabilities are implied by 'autopilot' suggest to me that Tesla should not be using the word.
I once had the privilege to sit in the cockpit during an entire flight. That was in the late nineties and probably would be completely out of the question nowadays.
The weather and visibility were shitty and what was really interesting was that they initiated the landing automatically, but when the runway become visible (about 400 meters) the first officer took over and landed the plane manually.
Two other things I learned is the amount of manuals they have available in that very cramped space (maybe maintained electronically nowadays) and that when you think that they just key in a couple sequences into the flight management system to then play solitaire you would be very wrong.
Both pilots where permanently active and on high alert during the entire one hour flight. That may be a bit more relaxed on long distance flights, but people who believe it's like driving a bus are really, really wrong.
it was an amazing and very interesting experience.
Tesla is claiming that if the drivers hands are not on the wheel then they are not responsible what what their "autopilot" does.
Autopilots in commercial aircraft - the kind that you'd be flying from San Francisco to New York are capable of far more then just dumb cruise control, including navigation and landing.
If 'maintain pitch and direction' were enough to be 'autopilot', then my SO's '97 Toyota Avalon had 'autopilot'.