If the promise of self-driving cars is ever fully realized, it will offer a profound change for wide swaths of society. But those changes haven't been instituted quite yet, as a drunk Tesla owner in San Francisco recently discovered. The inebriated driver tried and failed to talk his way out of a DUI by insisting the his car's Autopilot feature was guiding his way home.

On January 13, police discovered a passed out man in his Tesla on the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge. At 5:30 PM, there was heavy bridge traffic but the man's car remained immobile. Soon fellow, law-abiding motorists alerted the California Highway Patrol (CHP).

"It's pretty quick that we get those calls," Officer Vu Williams of the San Francisco CHP tells the San Francisco Chronicle. "We always have units patrolling the bridge."

The man, prodded awake by the highway patrol, argued that he was safe to be behind the wheel because his car was "on autopilot." Tesla advertises its Autopilot feature as "full self-driving hardware" that operates at "a safety level substantially greater than that of a human driver." The feature, which is comprised of eight cameras, twelve sensors and a forward facing radar, has been at the center of both life-saving rescues and fatal crashes.

But the CHP was not looking to have a debate about the future of driving. Rather, they were focused on the present, where they were looking at a man with a blood alcohol level of "at least twice" the legal limit.

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When u pass out behind the wheel on the Bay Bridge with more than 2x legal alcohol BAC limit and are found by a CHP Motor. Driver explained Tesla had been set on autopilot. He was arrested and charged with suspicion of DUI. Car towed (no it didn’t drive itself to the tow yard). pic.twitter.com/4NSRlOBRBL — CHP San Francisco (@CHPSanFrancisco) January 19, 2018

The San Francisco man isn't the first Tesla driver to be caught passed out behind the wheel. While Musk and Tesla don't actively promote current drivers to take a nap behind, they are quite happy to say that the capability to do so will be available by 2019.

If it means it keeps dangerous idiots like this from driving, the update can't come soon enough.

Source: Ars, San Francisco Chronicle

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