Systems-Theoretic Safety Assessment of Teleoperated Road Vehicles

TL;DR

This paper applies a systems-theoretic hazard analysis method to teleoperated road vehicles, addressing safety challenges and regulatory considerations for integrating teleoperation into automated driving systems.

Contribution

It introduces a systematic hazard analysis approach for teleoperated vehicles, filling a gap in safety assessment methods for such systems.

Findings

Identifies potential hazards in teleoperation systems

Adapts STPA method for teleoperation safety analysis

Provides insights for safety regulation compliance

Abstract

Teleoperation is becoming an essential feature in automated vehicle concepts, as it will help the industry overcome challenges facing automated vehicles today. Teleoperation follows the idea to get humans back into the loop for certain rare situations the automated vehicle cannot resolve. Teleoperation therefore has the potential to expand the operational design domain and increase the availability of automated vehicles. This is especially relevant for concepts with no backup driver inside the vehicle. While teleoperation resolves certain issues an automated vehicle will face, it introduces new challenges in terms of safety requirements. While safety and regulatory approval is a major research topic in the area of automated vehicles, it is rarely discussed in the context of teleoperated road vehicles. The focus of this paper is to systematically analyze the potential hazards of teleoperation systems. An appropriate hazard analysis method (STPA) is chosen from literature and applied to the system at hand. The hazard analysis is an essential part in developing a safety concept (e.g., according to ISO26262) and thus far has not been discussed for teleoperated road vehicles.