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Federal investigators probing California’s Tesla crashes

The wreck of a Tesla S vehicle
National Transportation Safety Board
/
Flickr / Creative Commons
The wreck of a Tesla S vehicle

A special investigation team from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is looking into a May 12th crash that killed three people on the Pacific Coast Highway in Newport Beach. The vehicle was reportedly employing Tesla’s Autopilot partially-automated driving system.

The Associated Press reported that the probe is part of a larger investigation regarding advanced driver assistance systems, including Tesla Autopilot. Since 2016, the NHTSA says there have been 34 crashes involving such systems, 28 of them involving Teslas. Fifteen people have died as a result of the accidents, with another 15 injured. According to documents, 14 of those deaths involved Teslas.

The recurring problem led the NHTSA to order automakers to report any accidents on public roads involving fully-autonomous vehicles, or those with partially-automated driver assist systems.

Sunni M. Khalid is a veteran of more than 40 years in journalism, having worked in print, radio, television, and web journalism.