Tesla's Autopilot System Drives Man To Hospital For A Medical Emergency

The incident took place late last month. Joshua decided to leave work early and head home from his law office in Springfield to his house in Branson. It usually took him about 45 minutes to reach home. When Joshua was about five miles out of Springfield, he started having some abdomen and stomach pains, which he later described them as aches like "a steel pole went through my chest." When he called his wife for help, she told him to go to the nearest hospital for immediate care. Taking her advice, he immediately set a course to the nearest hospital engaging the autopilot system of his Model X, which drove itself all the way with Joshua only steering the vehicle into the hospital's parking lot upon arrival.

As it turns out, the medical facility was located right next to the highway's exit ramp and Joshua soon found out that he was suffering from a pulmonary embolism. The Doctors said that with any more delay his lungs would have collapsed following an obstruction of a blood vessel, and the chances of him dying were very real. Though he went home the very same day, doctors told him he was lucky to have survived. That being said, Joshua does admit it probably would have been better to just pull the Model X over and call 911 to ask for an ambulance.

Joshua had recently bought his Model X after saving up for the car for years. With each passing day, he started to have more and more confidence in the electric SUV's Autopilot semi-autonomous driving system. Apparently, Joshua knew about the Florida crash and the probes that followed, but he had already ordered his Model X and was confident of his choice.

As for the autopilot system itself, Tesla's semi-autonomous driving system allows the car to pilot itself while handling the braking, accelerating, and steering of the vehicle for long stretches of highway driving. The system became the centre of a huge controversy when earlier this year two different accidents involving a Tesla Model S and Model X came to light. In both the cases, the drivers were believed to have engaged the autopilot system, in spite of which the cars crashed. In fact, the driver of the first incident even lost his life, whereas the occupants of the second incident survived the crash with injuries. Tesla even came out with two theories to explain the accidents.

Source: Slate.com