Federal transportation agency finds Tesla’s claims about feature don’t match their findings and opens second investigation
US auto-safety regulators said on Friday that their investigation into Tesla’s Autopilot had identified at least 13 fatal crashes in which the feature had been involved. The investigation also found the electric carmaker’s claims did not match up with reality.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) disclosed on Friday that during its three-year Autopilot safety investigation, which it launched in August 2021, it identified at least 13 Tesla crashes involving one or more death, and many more involving serious injuries, in which “foreseeable driver misuse of the system played an apparent role”.
It also found evidence that “Tesla’s weak driver engagement system was not appropriate for Autopilot’s permissive operating capabilities”, which resulted in a “critical safety gap”.
The NHTSA also raised concerns that Tesla’s Autopilot name “may lead drivers to believe that the automation has greater capabilities than it does and invite drivers to overly trust the automation”.
Tesla said in December that its largest-ever recall, covering 2.03m US vehicles – or nearly all of its vehicles on US roads – was to better ensure drivers pay attention when using its advanced driver-assistance system.
After closing the first investigation, regulators opened another, this one into whether that recall to install new Autopilot safeguards was adequate.
The NHTSA said it was opening the second investigation after identifying concerns due to crash events after vehicles had had the recall software update installed “and results from preliminary NHTSA tests of remedied vehicles”.
