Auto safety regulators in the USA said recently that they have opened an investigation into whether Tesla’s recall of more than two million vehicles announced in December to install new autopilot safeguards is adequate.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said it was opening an investigation after the agency identified concerns due to crash events after vehicles had the recall software update installed “and results from preliminary NHTSA tests of remedied vehicles.”
NHTSA also cited Tesla’s statement “that a portion of the remedy both requires the owner to opt in and allows a driver to readily reverse it.” The agency said Tesla has issued software updates to address issues that appear related to its concerns but has not made them “a part of the recall or otherwise determined to remedy a defect that poses an unreasonable safety risk.”
Tesla said in December its largest-ever recall covering 2.03 million USA vehicles – or nearly all of its vehicles on USA roads – was to better ensure drivers pay attention when using its advanced driver assistance system. The new recall investigation covers Model Y, X, S, 3 and Cybertruck vehicles in the USA equipped with autopilot produced between the 2012 and 2024 model years, NHTSA said. Tesla said in December Autopilot’s software system controls “may not be sufficient to prevent driver misuse” and could increase the risk of a crash.
The auto safety agency noted recently that during its autopilot safety probe it first launched in August 2021 it identified at least 13 Tesla crashes involving one or more deaths and many more involving serious injuries in which “foreseeable driver misuse of the system played an apparent role.”
