US opens investigation into Tesla after new accidents involving its self-driving technology

NEW YORK (AP) – Federal regulators are still open another investigation in Tesla’s self-driving feature after dozens of incidents in which cars ran red lights or drove on the wrong side of the road, sometimes crashing into other vehicles and causing injuries.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a filing that it was investigating 58 incidents in which Teslas allegedly violated traffic safety laws by using the company’s so-called fully autonomous driving mode, leading to more than a dozen crashes and fires and nearly two dozen injuries. The new probe adds to several other open probes into Tesla technology that could upend Elon Musk’s plans to turn millions of its cars already on the road into fully driverless vehicles with an over-the-air update to their software.

Investors sold Tesla shares Thursday afternoon, sending them down 1.1% to $433.75.

“The ultimate question is: ‘Does the software work?’ “, asked Seth Goldstein, a Morningstar analyst with a “sell” rating on the stock. Fund manager Ross Gerber added: “The world has become a giant testing ground for Elon’s fully autonomous driving concept, and it doesn’t work. »

The investigation comes as Musk, whose fortune as the world’s richest man comes partly from Tesla’s levitating shares, has promised to deploy hundreds of thousands of driverless taxis in cities across the United States by the end of next year.

The new survey covers 2.9 million vehicles, essentially all Teslas equipped with fully autonomous driving technology, or FSD, a misnomer criticized for incentivizing drivers to hand over full control of their cars. Tesla has argued to regulators and in court that it repeatedly told drivers that the system could not drive the cars on its own and that whoever was behind the wheel had to be ready to intervene at any time.

In the new investigation, regulators reported that many Tesla drivers involved in crashes said the cars failed to warn them of the unexpected behavior.

The agency behind the latest investigation, NHTSA, has opened a survey last year on driver assistance features in 2.4 million Teslas after several crashes in fog and other low visibility conditions, including one in which a pedestrian was killed. NHTSA also opened an investigation earlier this year into “summon” technology that allows drivers to tell their cars to go to their location for pickup after reports of several fender benders in parking lots.

Another investigation was launched by the agency in August to determine why Tesla failed to report accidents promptly according to needs.

That same month, a The Miami jury found that Tesla was partly responsible for a fatal crash in Florida in 2019 involving its Autopilot driver assistance technology – which is different from fully autonomous driving – and must pay victims more than $240 million in damages. Tesla said it would appeal the decision.

Fund manager Gerber, a longtime Tesla investor who says he was once a strong supporter of the company’s driver-assist feature, says the company should stop calling it fully autonomous driving and admit that the vision-only system using cameras on its cars needs to be supplemented with radar sensors and other hardware. Otherwise, regulators should force it to do so.

“They have to take responsibility for the fact that the software isn’t working properly and either adjust the hardware accordingly – and Elon can just deal with his ego issues – or someone will have to come in and say, ‘Hey, you keep causing accidents with this stuff and maybe you should just put it on test tracks until it works,'” he said.

The FSD system under study is what’s called Level 2 driver assistance software that requires drivers to pay their full attention to the road. A new version of FSD was introduced earlier this week. The company is also testing a significantly improved version that doesn’t require driver intervention, something Musk has been promising to roll out for years.

Tesla is under pressure to succeed with FSD because the main part of its business – selling cars – is struggling.

Customers who resent Elon Musk’s support for President Donald Trump and far-right candidates in Europe have boycotted the company, causing its sales to plummet. Meanwhile, competing electric vehicle makers, including China’s BYD, are stealing market share with cheaper, high-quality offerings.

In response, Musk announced Tuesday that Tesla would be s sell two new versions of models, lighter and less expensive already on the road, including its best-selling Model Y. But investors, hoping for lower prices or an entirely new offering, were unimpressed, sending the stock down 4.5%.

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Ott reported from Washington.