Heart-stopping video shows a self-driving Tesla crashing through a railroad gate, narrowly avoiding getting hit by an oncoming train.
Driver Joshua Brown said he was behind the wheel of his vehicle with full self-driving (FSD) mode engaged as he approached a level crossing near his home in Texas.
“The crossing gates were already fully lowered, the warning lights were flashing, and I could clearly see a train coming,” he told Storyful, recounting the scary near-miss Saturday.
“I relaxed in my seat, knowing it would be at least a minute before the bar went up and we could proceed safely,” he added.
Suddenly, dashcam footage shows the Tesla accelerating forward, crashing through the lowered crossing gate.
“I was completely shocked. It took me a full second – longer than I care to admit – to react,” Brown said.
“Years of racing have drilled the old adage into me, ‘When in doubt, throttle out.’ So instead of slamming the brakes, my instinct was to punch the gas,” he added.
“In that chaotic moment, I glanced to my right and saw the train barreling toward us – lights glaring, horn blaring. It was terrifyingly close,” Brown said.
“Somehow, the car pushed through to the other side of the tracks. Only then did I slam on the brakes and bring it to a stop,” he said.
In a darkly humorous moment, a message from Tesla then popped up on the screen, reading, “Autopilot disengaged, what happened?”
Brown said he has at least 40,000 self-driving miles under his belt, and this was the first time he’d ever been “let down” by Tesla’s FSD system.
Despite what its name suggests, Tesla instructs drivers to remain alert with their hands on the wheel even with FSD engaged.
Tesla says its FSD is seven times safer than the average US human driver when it is supervised, with one crash every 5-7 million miles against one per 660,000 for people, according to its Vehicle Safety Report.
However, in January, Tesla CEO Elon Musk admitted that it would still be “several years” before FSD unsupervised would be safer than a human.
Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.
