Tesla is the car company that gets talked about the most in the media. And rightfully so. Firstly, because its CEO is Elon Musk, who never stops making headlines. And secondly, because its cars are always involved in controversies, either due to Autopilot failures or due to innovative and incredible features.
Luckily for Tesla customers, today we are talking about Tesla implementing a new feature called “Driver Fatigue Warning,” which uses the car’s cabin camera to determine if the driver is too sleepy to drive.
According to the Electrek outlet, the description of the feature has started to appear in the European user manual of the Tesla Model 3, their best-selling car so far.
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Located under “Active Safety Features,” the Driver Fatigue Alert is “designed to notify drivers who appear to be drowsy by monitoring the driver’s facial features, as well as driving behavior to determine indicative patterns of drowsiness.
When drowsiness is detected in the driver, an alert is displayed on the touchscreen in the card area, and an alert sound is emitted.”
The manual states that the “Driver Fatigue Alert system is activated at speeds above 65 km/h when driving for a minimum of 10 minutes, and Autopilot is not engaged.” The alert will be cleared “once drowsiness patterns have been eliminated,” says the manual.
It’s worth noting that Tesla has already been using the cabin camera to monitor driver attention during Autopilot use. The new system is specifically used for non-Autopilot driving.
The feature can be turned off (or on) in Controls > Safety > Driver Fatigue Warning, but only for the current driving cycle.
Like other safety features in Tesla vehicles, the Driver Fatigue Warning is automatically re-enabled at the start of each driving cycle.
The American manual for the Model 3 does not mention this function yet. Therefore, it’s not clear if the feature is actually active anywhere.
