The fatal impact may not be seconds away but the event that sets in motion the series of actions that results in that fatal impact may take only seconds.
The issue is how long between the problem first manifesting itself and a crash becoming inevitable. Note that even as short a time as ten seconds is an order of magnitude longer than one second. There are at most only a few rare corner cases in aviation where proper use of the autopilot could take the airplane within a minute of an irretrievable situation that would not have occurred under manual control.
I'm not a pilot so I do not know the most dangerous situations when flying under autopilot. What I was trying to emphasize is that even under autopilot airplanes require constant attention. My understanding is that if the pilot or co-pilot leaves the cockpit for any reason the remaining pilot puts on an oxygen mask in case of decompression because the time frame before blackout is so tiny. The point is that autopilot in aviation is a tool that can be employed by pilots but cannot function safely on its own. From this viewpoint Tesla's Autopilot is accurately named although the public does not have the same understanding.
There are a lot of things in aviation that are done out of an abundance of caution (and rightly so) rather than because flights are routinely on the edge of disaster. Depressurization is not an autopilot issue, and putting on a mask is not the same as constant vigilance. Even when not using autopilot, pilots in cruise may be attending to matters like navigation and systems management that would be extremely dangerous if performed while driving.
Personally, I do not think calling Tesla's system 'autopilot' is the issue, but your claim that it is accurate is based on misunderstandings about the use of autopilots in aviation. It is not the case that their proper use puts airplanes on the edge of disaster were it not for the constant vigilance of the pilots.
If the pilots are not flying, then it can be just a short time away from a crash. Like when the pilot is not paying attention and by the time the auto pilot can no longer fly, the pilot doesn't have enough situational awareness to take over.
That is very much an outlier, and if it were at all relevant to the issue it would further weaken your case, as these three pilots had several minutes to sort things out. Questioning the assumptions underlying the assumed safety of airplane autopilot use can only weaken the claim that Tesla's 'autopilot' is safe.
