Automotive research firm finds that Tesla has higher frequency of deadly accidents than any other car brand

  • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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    5 hours ago

    I work as a valet driver and the Tesla - unlike any other car including the newer EVs from other brands - seems like it was designed by people who have never driven a car. Ever.

    Call me crazy but having nearly all the controls in a stupid idiotic touch screen where you have to scroll through multiple menus for basic car settings is a terrible idea. And so is braking by letting off the gas.

    And the people who buy them tend to be a certain kind of person… not the brightest

    • TheFriar@lemm.ee
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      3 hours ago

      Braking by letting off the gas? So you can’t coast, it’s either go or stop?

      • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        Yeah and I HATE it. I drove my cousins Tesla when it first came out, way before musk started publicly acting like the douchebro he is and before there was really a Tesla fanboy club with a bunch of wannabes slobbing musks knob online.

        I think I drove it in the neighborhood for like five minutes, stopped and parked the car and asked my cousin to drive it back. Hating it is an understatement.

        Last year all the valets and I agreed we won’t be parking Tesla’s because of how much we hate them, but management overruled us this year.

        I’ve been driving for 20 years. I shouldn’t need a lesson from a Tesla owner on how to drive their car. The fact that I do shows how fucking dangerous they are. They’re not designed by people who drive and it’s so fucking obvious that the computer nerds who design them get chauffeured everywhere by Ubers.

      • bitchkat@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        It’s called regen braking and puts energy back into battery. You can also control how strong the regen is in settings.

        I prefer strong regen and hold mode. The car will slow as soon as you release the accelerator pedal. Hold mode basically means the car stays put when it’s stopped until you press the accelerater. Creep mode would have the car roll forward when you release the brake.

        The one pedal driving works really well but there is a small learning curve. I would find it a bit annoying to switch back and forth like the valet guy.

    • dai@lemmy.world
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      12 hours ago

      I’ve got a “shitbox” VW Golf - the twin charger version, it’s only around 118kw. It’s not quick by any stretch of the imagination even with the bolt-on mods mine has so far.

      I’d not like to imagine the levels of trouble I’d find myself in owning even a midrange EV. Being able to give an EV a ham sandwich and hit 100kph in ~5 seconds or less is absurd.

      • ApatheticCactus@lemmy.world
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        6 hours ago

        Not to mention the weight. Those premium vehicles with long range stats are very heavy. That’s what makes them so terrifying to me.

  • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    But all they did was market their pretty good lane-assist and automated braking as a magic butler that lets you nap in the driver’s seat.

    How could this happen??

  • Pennomi@lemmy.world
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    24 hours ago

    Which is odd, because most electric vehicles (including some models of the Tesla) have better crash ratings due to having a crumple zone where the engine would be. Assuming that’s still true, there must be another factor that tips the balance towards deadly accidents. Some thoughts:

    • They are heavy cars. Maybe it’s safer for the passengers but more deadly for the other vehicle.
    • Maybe Tesla drivers are more irresponsible than other car owners.
    • Maybe the torque and acceleration is too high, causing people to lose control more often.
    • Maybe something that doesn’t get rated in the crash ratings causes deaths, eg. electric locks which are unable to open when power is lost, a likely scenario during collisions.
    • Maybe the FSD features are causing more collisions to happen.
    • baguettefish
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      6 hours ago

      "A vehicle’s size, weight, and height certainly play a part in its ability to protect passengers in a crash,” said Brauer. “But the biggest contributor to occupant safety is avoiding a crash, and the biggest factor in crash avoidance is driver behavior. A focused, alert driver, traveling at a legal or prudent speed, without being under the influence of drugs or alcohol, is the most likely to arrive safely regardless of the vehicle they’re driving.”

    • Lev_Astov@lemmy.world
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      12 hours ago

      Last time I looked up publicly available crash statistics in the US and calculated the per-maker numbers, Tesla was like 1/80th the typical per capita crashes of the average auto maker. That was a few years back, but I doubt that’s changed without some sketchy statistic interpretations.

      • oo1@lemmings.world
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        4 hours ago

        They looked at fatal crashes only, which is presumably a very small share of all crashes. They also normalised to per mile driven using a sample of data they have - presumably some data on miles driven by car type.

        Could be sketchy, could just be a much smaller sub-population.

      • baguettefish
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        6 hours ago

        they used crash statistics for new cars with models from 2018 to 2022, where tesla is the most dangerous brand

    • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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      22 hours ago

      Maybe Tesla drivers are more irresponsible than other car owners.

      That was going to be my suggestion.

      • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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        21 hours ago

        If there’s a systemic reason Tesla drivers have more accidents in a Tesla than drivers of other cars, that car is inherently less safe.
        You can’t simply put it down to “Tesla drivers suck”, that’s irresponsible and flawed logic.

        If it’s the acceleration, maybe we shouldn’t have cars that accelerate the way a Tesla can. But I very much doubt that is the reason except anecdotally. I suspect more that safety features may in fact serve to distract, or people “learn” to rely on them, and than they turn out to not be 100% reliable.

        We’ve all heard the weird tendency of Tesla breaking for no reason, that is hazard, also the turn signals are placed wrong, causing them to be impractical in some situations like roundabouts. Also the instrumentation in general of a Tesla is centered very much around the touch screen, another source of potential distraction. AFAIK even the speedometer isn’t placed where it should be to observe it quickly without looking away from the road for too long.

        A lot of inherent safety feature in traditional cars, have been shaved away in Tesla cars. Even getting out in an emergency can be a problem, as the handles may fail because they are electric, and the “real” handles are hidden.

        There a dozens of examples where Tesla is designed for less safety than traditional cars, and if (when) the safety features fail, I bet they are a lot less safe than if those features weren’t there to begin with.

        Tesla cars are designed with a VERY strong focus on reducing production cost, Elon Musk is even boasting about it, and how he has an uncompromising goal to simplify production. But Tesla also lack the experience about why things are like they are in traditional cars.

        • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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          5 hours ago

          Even getting out in an emergency can be a problem, as the handles may fail because they are electric, and the “real” handles are hidden.

          This killed a billionaire a few months ago… maybe not such a bad feature

        • JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz
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          20 hours ago

          The systemic reason might just simply be “They were the kind of a person that would buy a Tesla”.
          If I wanted to buy a safe car to drive responsibly while respecting all the traffic rules, an EV with almost a thousand horses with a 0-60 time of 2.1-2.4 seconds wouldn’t exactly be my first choice.

          • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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            19 hours ago

            If you want a more environmentally friendly car, which would you prefer: A Tesla or a Prius?
            A lot of Tesla cars were sold when there were very few to no alternatives if you wanted an EV.
            Also 2.1-2.4 is not normal for a Tesla. That’s the very fastest of them.

            • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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              5 hours ago

              Neither. Consumption isn’t environmentally friendly, it’s liberal greenwashing from leaders who think we can continue to consume infinite resources on a finite planet.

              • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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                5 hours ago

                That’s bullshit. EU has halved pollution and energy consumption since 1985, don’t tell me it doesn’t make a difference to work towards sustainability.

                • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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                  4 hours ago

                  The raw materials don’t grow on trees and aren’t renewable. EVs are a fantasy solution that doesn’t actually solve the problem. The batteries are full of rare earth metals and toxic as fuck.

                  The problem is consumption itself, but rich Europeans such as yourself pat yourself on the back for being so virtuous when really all you’re doing is replacing one kind of pollution (dead dinosaurs) for another (rare earth metals).

                  And as we’ve seen with environmental regulations for shipping, now that the ships burn cleaner fuel there’s less pollution, which means less particles for sunlight to reflect off of in the air leading to faster global warming. An unexpected negative side effect of reducing pollution.

                  Then there’s the freedom issues with EVs. They’re expensive as hell, you can’t work on them yourself or with an independent mechanic, and they can get bricked remotely whether by bad software update, because you missed your payment that month, or a cyber attack. Sorry but if they can brick my $500 phone with a software update there’s no way in fucking hell im allowing these tech companies access to a $25k car. The capitalists will find a way for planned obsolescence so this way the line forever goes up.

                  Fuck that I’ll take the ICE with minimal computer bullshit in it everyday. My 2013 Subaru Impreza with 230k miles on it is more environmentally friendly than buying some stupid new EV for $50k that I don’t have. Keeping an efficient ICE car on the road for as long as it will drive is more efficient than trading it in for any EV. Raw materials don’t grow on trees.

                  100 companies produce 70% of the worlds pollution (not including the US military which is the largest single polluter in the world) fuck this EV and no plastic straws or bags bullshit. It’s not on individuals. Capitalism itself needs to be fucking overthrown if we have any chance of stopping climate change. And it’s already likely too late - the time to overthrow was in the 90s and people tried. A whole lot of leftist groups in the US got thrown life in prison as “terrorists” for it. ELF and ALF.

            • JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz
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              19 hours ago

              Prius. Teslas are way too large and heavy for my tastes.
              Though preferably I’d swap my VW Up to an electric one, they were too expensive back when I got mine.

              As for the acceleration figure, I took it from this review:

              We haven’t tested a standard Tesla Model S for some time, but a 2020 model that we ran through our instrumented test regimen reached 60 mph in a blistering 2.4 seconds. You can expect roughly similar performance from the current standard Model S today. The gonzo Plaid version, which boasts a third electric motor and 1020 horsepower, reached 60 mph in just 2.1 seconds in our testing.

              • jakobmn@feddit.dk
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                7 hours ago

                We have had an e-UP for 3 years. We have ended up driving more in that than in our “primary” car which is a Golf. Had an ID5 as a loaner once, and it was great to get our UP back instead. If only the ID3 could tow our 1200kg caravan, that would be an ideal replacement for the Golf some day. Most electric cars are too large and heavy for my taste as well.

            • Grimy@lemmy.world
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              19 hours ago

              Tesla seems to me like a performance car that’s sold as a luxury car. I think a lot of drivers bought it when they might not be able to handle them. Anecdotally, I remember my mom spinning out at a light years ago after she bought a used luxury vehicle that was actually a powerhouse.

              That being said, your points are more then valid and user error is at most a small part of the equation.

        • olympicyes@lemmy.world
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          20 hours ago

          I am convinced it’s the acceleration. Also because you have that ability, it influences you to take risks in traffic (eg. Pulling out of a stopped lane) that you might not take in an ICE car because you can’t hit a high scored fast enough. They opened Pandora’s box by making every family car a Porsche.

          • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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            20 hours ago

            I haven’t noticed that at all for Tesla, and I did absolutely notice with BMW and AUDI for many years. Not so much driving fast, as driving like assholes. Yes an EV often starts quicker at a read light, but I’ve never seen anything wild here that I recall, and we have a lot of Tesla and other EV cars here now (Denmark).

            But to be honest, it may be different here, because ICE cars are generally manual, which is way more fun to drive. With A Tesla you just press the speeder like an Automatic. It just responds faster. But a Tesla can also be driven for comfort, and it seems to me that’s what just about everybody does here.

    • ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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      21 hours ago

      When this was posted last week, I mentioned that it was odd that all the most deadliest models on the list were all low production cars, meaning there might be something wonky with their methodology.

      There was a similar “study” done a year or so ago where they simply looked at car insurance applications and used people’s accident history and whatever vehicle they were trying to insure at the time to generate a list of which models had the “most accidents” in an incredibly flawed manor (Pontiac and Oldsmobile were among the safest even though neither company exists anymore).

      • Artyom@lemm.ee
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        20 hours ago

        The study said they normalize by mileage, which will account for both model popularity and driving distance. Driving safety is usually reported in incidents per mile or something to that effect, so that’s all standard.

      • JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz
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        20 hours ago

        The data is by “Fatal Accident Rate (Cars per Billion Vehicle Miles)”, Model Y having 10.6, Model S having 5.8. Ignoring Model 3, the average would be 8.2. Back in 2023 Tesla tweeted “Total miles driven by the Tesla fleet has exceeded 100 billion miles globally—equal to 532 round trips to the sun!”
        So that math says 820 fatal accidents, Tesladeaths reports 614. I’d say the numbers seem close enough?

    • Artyom@lemm.ee
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      20 hours ago

      My bet is on the extra torque being the primary problem. Rental companies have complained about increased incident rates, and they’re probably not renting out Teslas.

        • Blaat1234@lemmy.world
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          7 hours ago

          And they did U turn on that. June 2024:

          Hertz is dumping Teslas onto the used car market. The rental car agency made a huge mis-step by ordering too many electric cars, and now it’s rushing to offload 30,000 EVs. Tesla makes up roughly one-third of all of Hertz’s global EV fleet.

          Since January, Hertz has been aggressively offloading teslas at the nationwide average price of roughly $25,000, according to CNBC. Earlier this year in a regulatory filing, Hertz said, “expenses related to collision and damage, primarily associated with EV, remained high.” in the first quarter, Hertz took a $195 million write-down for depreciation of its EVS.

    • Viri4thus@feddit.org
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      21 hours ago

      Or, hear me out, maybe they are just shit because so many corners have been cut in manufacturing that tesla cars should be perfect spheres by now.

    • RandomStickman@fedia.io
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      23 hours ago

      Maybe Tesla drivers are more irresponsible than other car owners.

      This is my first thought. Anecdotally Tesla drivers joins the ranks of Audi and BMW of insane drivers around me.

      • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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        23 hours ago

        Eh, I’ve seen the opposite. Most of the Tesla drivers in my area seem to drive relatively slowly. Yes, Teslas can go fast, but that burns through range like crazy, so I think a lot of them want that better range.

        BMW drivers here are the worst because act completely entitled. They’ll cross multiple lanes on the highway w/o signaling, aggressively pass on the right just to slow down to the speed of traffic again, and they’ll park across multiple parking stalls. Audis are similar, but the demographics seem to skew a bit older.

        Here are the main demographics I tend to see in my area (Utah):

        • wannabe cowboys - big lifted trucks
        • rich “racers” - BMW, sports cars (mostly Corvettes here), etc
        • entitled “family” types - huge SUVs (esp. Cadillac Escalade)
        • “outdoorsy” people (and wannabe “outdoorsy” people) - Subaru
        • wannabe “green” people - Tesla, Rivian, etc
        • actual green people - Chevy Bolt, Toyota Prius

        The first three drive super aggressively, the fourth can vary, the fifth drives pretty normal, and the last tend to drive pretty conservatively. At least that’s my read from my area.

        • Buffalox@lemmy.world
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          19 hours ago

          That’s Exactly my experience with Tesla drivers too (Denmark), Tesla drivers generally drive “comfortably” as I see it, and I’ve never seen a Tesla show off at a red light.
          In my experience Tesla drivers are responsible drivers as much as everybody else. So I am pretty sure this is NOT a driver issue.

      • Wrench@lemmy.world
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        22 hours ago

        They’re a cross between BMW drivers and incapable Prius drivers from the oast when they were the first hybrids.

        Aka, you have the douches driving like entitled dicks because of the speed and prestige of the brand, and then you have the eco focused clueless drivers putting around.

        I tend to keep a wary eye on all teslas because either way, they’re unpredictable.

    • Jesus@lemmy.world
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      23 hours ago

      Re bullet 2. Irresponsibility.

      My theory is that it is isn’t the badge on the car, it’s the fact that people’s grocery getter now was the performance of a high-end sports car from a decade ago. And, like a with a sports car, Teslas are designed to encourage users to have “fun” driving. Every test drive from a Tesla store ALWAYS includes a segment where the store rep encourages people gun it onto or on a large open road.

      Before Telsa it was the German manufacturers who dominated the commuter-car-with-sports-car-performance market. And guess what? Those people drove like a-holes.

      • taladar@sh.itjust.works
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        17 hours ago

        Those people drove like a-holes.

        That is not true. I mean the bit where you put that into the past tense. They still do.

    • Morphit @feddit.uk
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      23 hours ago

      I expect (hope) it’s a small factor, but I wonder where pedestrian fatalities fit in. Several of the worst models seem to be large SUVs or sports cars - alongside these Teslas and some rather cheaper compact cars.

      • inv3r510n@lemmy.world
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        5 hours ago

        Large SUVs must be worse for pedestrians because they’re essentially tanks that you can’t see out in front of for a good 20’ or so. A small child running to get their ball in the road will be completely invisible to a large SUV whereas a Tesla driver would be able to see the child a lot sooner and hopefully avoid them.

        • oo1@lemmings.world
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          3 hours ago

          oh yeah, “… at least one occupant fatality”.

          The source dataset seems to have pedestrian/non-occupant fatalities, pretty shitty of tthem to go out of their way to exclude them.

    • Ebby@lemmy.ssba.com
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      23 hours ago

      This is my hunch too. Perhaps the UI is more distracting with Tesla’s implementation of screens/menus/feedback for car functions too.

      Just pointing out the study emphasize occupant fatalities which I take as to exclude external fatalities such as other vehicles.

      • Pennomi@lemmy.world
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        21 hours ago

        Oh yeah, the big infotainment system could definitely be a factor in bad driving.

        Also thanks for pointing out the methodology on how they’re counting fatalities, that easily scratches one item off my list.

  • NameTaken@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    There are approximately 250 million cars on the road and they only used data from 8 million? That’s 3% of cars on the road to extrapolate into all the cars on the road. Seems like a huge flaw especially since we didn’t know how they got that subset. All seems like click bait as most articles related to Tesla are…

    Another good way / better way to see what cars are dangerous are insurance rates. Since insurance companies take in way more data than 8M cars when determining rates.

    • bluewing@lemm.ee
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      3 hours ago

      Tesla’s do cost more to insure than ‘average’ cars. But, that extra cost reflects more the cost to repair minor/moderate damage than cost of fatalities. Since fatalities are just a smaller subset accidents. Tesla’s are extremely costly to repair and often get totaled vs repaired. Premiums reflect that cost of loss.

      3% of 250 million could very well be the approximate number of cars on the roads that are involved in a fatal collision. And that is the only consideration of the article in this study.

    • viking@infosec.pub
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      5 hours ago

      That’s more than 3% of the user base. 0.5% is considered sufficient for statistical relevance.

      • oo1@lemmings.world
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        4 hours ago

        … sufficiently random …

        Since they just use the 8m for the normalisation it’d be interesting to know how sensitive the rankings are if they assumed some bias. Or maybe even just swap around some normalisation factors and see how robust the ranking is.

        I guess they do have near complete data on the deaths, and pretty good data on the population of registered vehicles.

        • bluewing@lemm.ee
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          3 hours ago

          The data on that is all there. Records like car fatalities are collected mainly through law enforcement reports and states have registration numbers. But the question is, how centralized is the data? City, county, state, or federal? There is a lot of data that simply isn’t required to be collected to a central agency to keep track of.

      • NameTaken@lemmy.world
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        4 hours ago

        Just honestly asking Im not a statistician. From a lay person looking high level this seems weird. The conclusion also does not match up with insurance prices that I’ve personally seen nor correspond with my experience.

        I’m here for discussion not trying to put anyone down. Could someone just explain to me what I’m missing. No need to downvote. So if you take a non random sample of data how can you extrapolate that out so much? Does this data line up with other people’s data? What am I missing?

  • Valmond@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    So we will see some insane stuff from Elox to take the spotlight from this or meh?

  • Semi-Hemi-Lemmygod@lemmy.world
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    24 hours ago

    I wonder if they have the data broken down by propulsion technology rather than manufacturer. One thing about Teslas and other luxury electric cars is that they have insane amounts of horsepower and instant torque. If you buy a Model S to schlep the kids around and are expecting it to behave like a minivan you’ll be really surprised what happens if you floor it.

    I’m curious to know if this trend is the same for other high-powered electric cars like the Hummer or Rivian. Cars that go that fast used to be limited to supercars, not large and widespread SUVs and pickups.

    (Note this is not saying electric is bad or we shouldn’t use it. But maybe manufacturers could ease up on the mo powah baby.)

    But I also agree with the article that it could be related to their claims of “full self driving” because people might trust it too much and just not pay attention, or have it fail to detect something.

    • schizo@forum.uncomfortable.business
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      24 hours ago

      ease up on the mo powah baby

      But… but… more power better.

      But the article seems to be about deadly accidents, and not just accidents.

      You can hit an awful lot of things at a shocking rate of speed and walk away with modern car crash design, so I’d be inclined to think it’s more than just the torque curve responsible for all the dead people.

      • Semi-Hemi-Lemmygod@lemmy.world
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        23 hours ago

        I’m all for mo powah baby, but only for people who can handle it. Grandma driving to the store shouldn’t be able to get their car to act like a Mustang leaving a car meet.

        Plus electric cars are a ton heavier which means way more kinetic energy which can cause worse accidents, negating some of the crash safety improvements, especially in smaller cars.

    • Morphit @feddit.uk
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      23 hours ago

      Yeah the Rolling Stone article is written really weirdly. I don’t think it’s technically wrong anywhere but it reads really misleadingly when you compare it to the actual report.

      Like it leads with “the group identified the Tesla Model S and Tesla Model Y as two of the most dangerous cars” - meaning they are in the list - at sixth and twenty first places respectively. The mix is really weird though. As you mention the top of the list is cars like the Chevy Corvette and Porsche 911, but also things like the Mitsubishi Mirage and a load of Kia models. So it seems like there’s a lot to interpret there.

      Certainly it’s somewhat damning that despite the driver assistant technology, these models are not particularly safer. But I think other manufactures have a wide range of vehicles at different price points that also vary in safety, which brings their averages below Tesla’s in the final rankings.

      • Semi-Hemi-Lemmygod@lemmy.world
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        23 hours ago

        Thank you for linking to the actual report. It makes a lot more sense. Since they’re basing it on occupant fatalities it makes sense that smaller cars are deadlier, since they’ll suffer more damage in an accident. It’s also interesting that the small SUVs are more deadly, which I attribute to the low mass and high CoG leading to more frequent rollovers.

        • Usernameblankface@lemmy.world
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          23 hours ago

          Aha, occupant fatalities. I was hoping to find out if they were measuring people inside the cars mentioned or people in other cars or pedestrians or all of the above

      • Morphit @feddit.uk
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        23 hours ago

        As a note, it looks like the data they used is publicly available from the NHTSA. They mention that “models not in production as of the 2024 model year, and low-volume models were removed from further analysis.” I wonder where the Hummer and Rivian show up there since they are not mentioned in the report whatsoever.

    • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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      24 hours ago

      It’s 100% FSD…

      A human driver will almost always realize they’re actively having an accident, and will be slamming breaks and attempting to swearve.

      FSD not noticing something and driving straight into it won’t react itll just act like what it’s about to hit isn’t there right up until the collusion.

      A second of brakes before an interstate accident and human drivers instinct to protect their side of the car goes a long way to saving lives.

        • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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          23 hours ago

          What specifically do you want a source for?

          Because I said a couple things, and you were vague so I have to guess.

          And it could legitimately be any of the sentences I typed.

          A good way to be sure you’re asking a question that can be answered is quoting what you’re referencing:

          FSD not noticing something and driving straight into it won’t react itll just act like what it’s about to hit isn’t there right up until the collusion.

          But I mean, that’s just physics…

          Applying brakes before a crash would (well I guess should) obviously lead to a crash with less force.

          Anyways, if you can tell me what exactly you want a source for and what claim you’re even talking about. I can probably find something for you. But it’s not like I had to go look at data in the instant to reference before making that comment. So I have to go find whatever your asking me for.

          This would have all happened a lot faster if you just googled what you doubted. I mean, by now you may have already done that.

          So I’m glad you didn’t just type “source?” But what you did type was just as helpful in telling me what you wanted.

    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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      23 hours ago

      Model S… you’ll be really surprised what happens if you floor it

      Honestly, I’ve almost never seen anyone in a Tesla floor it. Yeah, maybe once or twice when they first get it, but most dual motor Teslas I see drive pretty conservatively, probably because they want better mileage per charge or something.

    • NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world
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      23 hours ago

      they have insane amounts of horsepower and instant torque

      No, no. The car is not driving you. You are driving the car. It must do what you want.

      If you let the car drive you, then no wonder you are dead quite soon. So, maybe these numbers are indeed telling something about Tesla drivers…?

      • Semi-Hemi-Lemmygod@lemmy.world
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        23 hours ago

        If there’s too much power the car will start driving you. Just like how Mustang drivers leaving car meets frequently get themselves in trouble by not being able to control the power they’ve got.

        • NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world
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          23 hours ago

          If there’s too much power the car will start driving you.

          I have learned this from my mother.

          When she was young and already married, it was the time when women could not drive cars very good. At least not as good as all the men. At least that was what the tradition and every man said, and they had many such stories to tell.

          So my dad got a BMW 5 series then.

          People in the village started to warn my mother, for serious! Be careful. Maybe better don’t drive it at all. This thing could easily run away with you.

          My mother stayed super cool and told them nothing is going to happen, it needs me first to press down the pedal. And although she really did not drive it as often as my dad did, she was a good and safe driver.

      • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        20 hours ago

        No, no. The car is not driving you. You are driving the car. It must do what you want.

        you have to understand how to tell the car what you want, and that’s the issue at hand

        People who’ve been driving has cars for 10+ years are going to have a harder time adjusting to the way an EV drives. Subconsciously it’s easy to forget the differences in throttle response and how coasting works, every time I have to drive a gas car it feels like I’m driving in molasses

        Even skilled drivers have trouble adapting at first because of how different it is. Luckily my car has a mode where it drives more like a gas car so the wife and I used that for a while to adjust to driving it, now I almost never use that mode, but if I leave it off and someone ELSE drives my car theyre likely to burn out my tires a bit even if I warm them, there’s that much more torque

  • Shdwdrgn@mander.xyz
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    24 hours ago

    I’m having a hard time understanding this article. They say the Teslas have the highest rating of deadly accidents, but then go on to say Tesla ranked #6 on the list of fatalities, then once again stated Tesla was the worst. So what happened to the other five vehicles that had a higher fatality rating?

    • RandomStickman@fedia.io
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      23 hours ago

      The way I understood it is the highest rate of deadly accidents refers to “5.6 fatal accidents per billion miles traveled” by the brand overall. The number 6 rating refers to the Model S specifically.

      • Clent@lemmy.world
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        11 hours ago

        Another way to interpret this is that other brands have vehicles that are far safer than thei unsafest model, while any Tesla model is unsafe.

      • oo1@lemmings.world
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        3 hours ago

        Or, their manufacturers also make some safer vehicles. It seems that all of Tesla’s vehicles are high up the list, so the whole manufacturer average is higher than all others. Wheras Hyundai, for example, must sell plenty of safer models that bring down its average.

  • CitizenKong@lemmy.world
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    24 hours ago

    Yep, his battery factory in Germany got into lots of PR trouble for poisoning ground water and having a three times higher rate of work related accidents then is normal.

  • Eideen@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    To adjust for exposure, the number of cars involved in a fatal crash were normalized by the total number of vehicle miles driven, which was estimated from iSeeCars’ data of over 8 million vehicles on the road in 2022 from model years 2018-2022.

    Gived the number are estimated, how can we trust them?

    • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      20 hours ago

      iSeeCars’ data of over 8 million vehicles on the road in 2022

      It uses actual data to get a baseline of brand percentages then expands that to the total vehicles on the road total

      Its not going to be a perfect estimate, but it’s going to be close enough to avoid major errors unless something weird happened with the initial data (like not being diverse enough, but with 8 million cars that’s unlikely)

      • Eideen@lemmy.world
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        4 hours ago

        I don’t think it needs to perfect, but without seeing the data I can’t trust it. ie one of the way the results can rigged is to set lower kilometers travel for some models.

  • A_A@lemmy.world
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    20 hours ago

    e.v. drive weird.

    Because they are very different machines on the same road :
    in internal combustion engine vehicle, going downhill : let’s accelerate a (little?) bit !

    The electric car driver :
    (slowing down) let’s charge the battery !