Teslas Are Safer and Here Is Proof

These are good numbers, and I hope they point to a better future for automobile safety. But I am very concerned that the claim of Full Self Driving leads to unrealistic expectations from drivers. Such a course is irresponsible given the automation fatigue that has been documented. When people are required to pay close attention to a task that is nearly fully automated they just cannot do it. Then lives are put in danger.

Very weak methodology here.

First, accidents per 10,000 vehicles is only one piece of the puzzle. You also have to consider accident outcomes: how well the car does in crash tests. Tesla does do very well but that data isn’t considered in this article.

I’m sure there are very few accidents in classic cars driven very carefully but that doesn’t mean they’re safe cars.

Accidents per 10,000 vehicles is also flawed because it doesn’t seem to be considering miles driven. Electric cars will be driven less than gasoline ones as a rule due to their range and recharging limitations. Tesla owners don’t go far, if they were road warriors they’d be choosing gasoline.

Also, Tesla has an exclusivity and recency bias. The company was only able to mass produce vehicles at significant volume in the last 3 years or so. All these other brands have millions of older cars on roads that don’t benefit from modern collision avoidance features.

If this methodology did more to only consider the most recent years of vehicles in a similar price range, I don’t think Tesla would be especially unique. A 2022 BMW or Mercedes is also going to come with very good collision avoidance and self-driving features.

The expense of a Tesla also means that people with the best socioeconomic outcomes are their customers. These are the types of people that probably already have fewer car accidents, health problems, and longer overall lifespans because they have more time, money, and eduction that reduce the problems they face in life.

They have the money to maintain a late model year vehicle with all the safety features and don’t drive on bald tires and shoddy suspension.

You can see this on their list with Ferrari being high on the list along with Tesla. There’s nothing particularly safe about a Ferrari compared to other cars, it’s just being driven by someone who is most definitely going to be paying attention.

Finally, I’ll point out that no personal vehicle is safer than public bus and rail transportation. Tesla isn’t solving the world’s transit problems, it’s still just another representative of unsustainable automobile-based city development that is bankrupting our towns one-by-one.

So, the only ‘proof’ given is https://www.rivervaleleasing.co.uk/blog/posts/which-cars-hav..., which compares brands on #accidents per car sold.

I don’t think that’s a good metric. A better one would be #accidents per kilometer driven, and even then, it would think that would favor newer, expensive brands because younger, less experienced drivers tend to drive older, cheaper cars)

so, it doesn’t surprise me that the top 10 on that metric has many brands for cars that, on average, aren’t driven a lot of kilometers each year such as Ferrari and Maserati.

That article knows that, too, as it states “By this measure, it’s the Vauxhall Zafira that has had the most incidents, with over 500 accidents for every 10,000 models. However, this is likely not related to the Zafira itself as the car rated was five stars for safety by Euro NCAP, with standard features like seat belt reminders and an airbag cut-off switch for children.”

So, the claim is that this metric proofs Teslas are safe compared to other cars, even though the article that introduced the metric acknowledges the metric can’t be used to measure relative safety.

I'm pretty sure, that when planes were big enough to accommodate two pilots: a senior pilot with more experience; and a junior pilot with less experience (but sharper eyes and reflexes) -- safety for the pilot/copilot aircraft was superior, despite the junior pilot being sloppier at navigation and judgment, than the senior pilot. No one would advocate that the junior pilot is superior to the senior pilot.

Someday, if FULL self driving is to live up to its actual name, the car will be run entirely with the FSD responsible for safe travels. Lets see what happens then.

The only data offered are rates of accidents by manufacturer. By this logic Morris, a car company who went defunct in 1984, are the safest cars to drive. This is so obviously false one has to question the methodology. And the obvious flaw: small sample sizes mean high variance in the estimator.

Would you rather drive 101 with human drivers or Tesla’s on autopilot?