# BANG! Did I collide with a ghost car?



## FogNoggin (Mar 19, 2019)

About a month ago I was driving down the main drag in Gatlinburg Tennessee, a popular tourist town with very slow bumper-to-bumper traffic on most days. The light turned green and I drove forward at about walking speed. After a few seconds, BOOM! The car came to an abrupt stop with a LOUD noise, exactly as if I'd rear-ended the car in front of me, who was also stopped. I got out of the car to assess the situation. There was about 6 feet between me and the car in front and about 10 feet to the car behind me. Nothing hit my car from any direction. The only clue as to what may have caused this was the car stopped straddling a very well painted striped crosswalk. I was shaken. This has not happened since.

One more note. When we first got smart-summon, I played with it while sitting _inside _the car. I learned that when you stop summon, the car comes to an IMMEDIATE and violent stop in a way you can't appreciate when watching _outside _the car. The sensation is not unlike my collision with the ghost car. Has anyone else experienced this?

P.S. No, I didn't think to save the TeslaCam video. I'm kicking myself.


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## FRC (Aug 4, 2018)

FogNoggin said:


> About a month ago I was driving down the main drag in Gatlinburg Tennessee, a popular tourist town with very slow bumper-to-bumper traffic on most days. The light turned green and I drove forward at about walking speed. After a few seconds, BOOM! The car came to an abrupt stop with a LOUD noise, exactly as if I'd rear-ended the car in front of me, who was also stopped. I got out of the car to assess the situation. There was about 6 feet between me and the car in front and about 10 feet to the car behind me. Nothing hit my car from any direction. The only clue as to what may have caused this was the car stopped straddling a very well painted striped crosswalk. I was shaken. This has not happened since.
> 
> One more note. When we first got smart-summon, I played with it while sitting _inside _the car. I learned that when you stop summon, the car comes to an IMMEDIATE and violent stop in a way you can't appreciate when watching _outside _the car. The sensation is not unlike my collision with the ghost car. Has anyone else experienced this?
> 
> P.S. No, I didn't think to save the TeslaCam video. I'm kicking myself.


My car did something very similar a few weeks ago when it encountered a pile of leaves in the roadway that the landscapers had heaped up about 3 feet high. Very abrupt stop, but no noise that I recall.


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## garsh (Apr 4, 2016)

Did you happen to be supercharging shortly before this?
Loud banging noise when supercharging

Or did you have a large change in elevation?
Banging sound while climbing hills in cold weather

The "stopping" part may have been unrelated to the "bang" part.


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## FogNoggin (Mar 19, 2019)

garsh said:


> Did you happen to be supercharging shortly before this?
> Loud banging noise when supercharging
> 
> Or did you have a large change in elevation?
> ...


No to both questions. Fairly level terrain and temps in the 60's, level 2 charging the night before. It was much louder than the supercharger thump.


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## Madmolecule (Oct 8, 2018)

That's why I added one of these. To warn others That it may do some crazy stuff.


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## FogNoggin (Mar 19, 2019)

Madmolecule said:


> That's why I added one of these. To warn others That it may do some crazy stuff.


You just jogged my memory. We had driven past the Hollywood Star Cars museum where Bumblebee is on display. My car is obviously a Decepticon and was just a little agitated after seeing the Autobot.


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## FogNoggin (Mar 19, 2019)

I just found this on YouTube. You can hear a rather dramatic BOOM as the car comes to a sudden stop. And just like my experience, there was no _beep-beep-beep-beep_ to warn me, the car simply reacted.


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## MelindaV (Apr 2, 2016)

FogNoggin said:


> I just found this on YouTube. You can hear a rather dramatic BOOM as the car comes to a sudden stop. And just like my experience, there was no _beep-beep-beep-beep_ to warn me, the car simply reacted.


I love their reactions. if they were on the US side of Niagra the swearing likely would have been not nearly as calm. lol


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## garsh (Apr 4, 2016)

FogNoggin said:


> I just found this on YouTube. You can hear a rather dramatic BOOM as the car comes to a sudden stop.


I didn't hear any "boom" in that video. Just tire squeal.


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## FogNoggin (Mar 19, 2019)

It's there if you turn up the volume, though I also have a subwoofer attached to my computer which helps to hear it.


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## Bokonon (Apr 13, 2017)

Strange. 

Long shot, but... Is the Obstacle-Aware Acceleration safety feature (for avoiding collisions at low speed) enabled? I've never triggered it, so I don't know how it behaves or whether it provides any visible/audible feedback to the driver... but I thought I'd throw it out there as another possibility.


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## GDN (Oct 30, 2017)

Bokonon said:


> Strange.
> 
> Long shot, but... Is the Obstacle-Aware Acceleration safety feature (for avoiding collisions at low speed) enabled? I've never triggered it, so I don't know how it behaves or whether it provides any visible/audible feedback to the driver... but I thought I'd throw it out there as another possibility.


Honestly I would love to see some examples of this and know more from Tesla exactly how this works and when. This is not one of those things any of us can test well without some real danger, but would be nice to see Tesla take a few of their test cars and make some better demo videos of this feature.


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## MelindaV (Apr 2, 2016)

GDN said:


> Honestly I would love to see some examples of this and know more from Tesla exactly how this works and when. This is not one of those things any of us can test well without some real danger, but would be nice to see Tesla take a few of their test cars and make some better demo videos of this feature.


my parking space at work is an angled space against a wall, with a pipe bollard near the driver side headlight. I normally try to get as close to the bollard as I am comfortable (about where the sonar sensors start yelling at 12"). 
Shortly after the obstacle aware feature was released, I was leaving work and had thought in reverse - but instead was in drive. instead of starting to roll backward (obviously), it slowly rolled forward until it essentially stopped with the collision warning by the time I realized the issue. In all, it probably only moved 4 or 6 inches. if it had been at the normal speed for that amount of accelerator pressure, it would have hit the bollard.


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