Late last month, Tesla CEO Elon Musk told those listening in on the brand’s fourth-quarter earnings call that Full Self Driving (FSD) tech will be hitting the market this year. It’s the ninth year on the trot that Musk has made the promise, underlining that the firm has had difficulties in getting the system into the hands of customers.
Numerous videos have been published online detailing FSD’s shortcomings in various applications on public roads, with some showing owners having to intervene to prevent their cars from causing accidents and crossing the centre line, among other dramas one would hope a system like this would know not to do.
Now, another video has emerged showing some of the most damning footage of FSD’s shortcomings. You can watch the video below.
The video was posted by Tesla Model Y owner Taylor Ogen, showing a variety of snippets from a drive around the city streets of Boston that he claims was only 22 minutes in length on a route just 4.5 miles long.
In the video, Ogen’s Model Y makes numerous errors. It drives on the wrong side of the road multiple times, including attempting to turn onto the wrong side of the road at an intersection. It almost hits a slow-moving truck crossing the intersection in front of it.
On several occasions it appears to be confused by parked cars, the FSD software potentially unsure whether to treat them as static objects or as traffic to interact with. Either way, the brief clip shows the system driving very poorly.
“Here’s a typical drive on Tesla FSD Beta, and why it’s the opposite of useful. It’s most certainly not even close to being ‘safer than a human’, by any factor. 22-minute drive, 4.5 miles, and WAY too many interventions,” Ogen posted.
The video gained prominence in the same week that Tesla confirmed it would be recalling approximately 54,000 vehicles over a software issue that allows their cars to roll through stop signs while semi-autonomous driving is activated, instead of actually coming to a full stop.
It should be noted that Ogen was one of the Tesla owners that sounded the alarm on the issue of cars not stopping for stop signs. Although Ogen is a Tesla owner, he has long been a cynic of the brands semi-autonomous systems.
Speaking to CarScoops, he noted that he’s had good experiences using FSD on wide open motorways. But on tight urban roads “it is crazy”.
Speaking during Tesla’s recent 2021 Q4 earnings call, Musk noted that FSD is going to be the brand’s most important profit generator in the coming years, adding that he’s confident that it will be completed this year.
“Full Self-Driving. So, over time, we think Full Self-Driving will become the most important source of profitability for Tesla. It’s — actually, if you run the numbers on robotaxis, it’s kind of nutty — it’s nutty good from a financial standpoint,” he said.
“And I think we are completely confident at this point that it will be achieved. And my personal guess is that we’ll achieve Full Self-Driving this year, yes, with data safety level significantly greater than present.”
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