Tesla vehicles sit in the parking lot of a Tesla dealership in Austin, Texas, April 15, 2024.
Brandon Bell | Getty Images
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is pressuring Tesla for answers about changes the company made to its Autopilot driver assistance system following a voluntary software recall in December that affected about 2 million of vehicles in the United States.
Tesla must meet a July 1 deadline to provide information to the regulator or face fines of up to $135.8 million, according to a letter NHTSA sent to the company on May 6.
The recall aimed to improve Tesla’s driver engagement systems, which are used to monitor whether drivers are safely using features such as traffic-aware cruise control, lane keeping and automatic steering – which make part of the autopilot. Since the recall, at least 20 Tesla vehicles have been involved in crashes in which the system appears to be used, according to a document posted on the NHTSA website.
The ‘recall remedies’ investigation follows a three-year investigation by NHTSA that found safety issues with Tesla Autopilot contributed to at least 467 crashes and 14 deaths from January 2018 to August 2023.
NHTSA concluded that the drivers involved in these crashes “were not sufficiently engaged in the driving task and that the warnings provided by Autopilot when Autosteer was engaged did not adequately ensure that drivers maintained their attention.” on the driving task.
Driver engagement systems, sometimes called driver monitoring systems, in Tesla vehicles include torque sensors in the steering wheel to detect whether drivers keep their hands on the wheel, and in-cab cameras that monitor the driver’s gaze. driver. They must alert any inattentive driver to pay attention and remain ready to steer or brake at all times.
NHTSA has been seeking detailed crash data from Tesla since it issued the Autopilot recall update, including data and video stored in or streamed from its cars and maintained by the company.
They also request documents on Tesla’s engineering teams and their approach to “decision making in determining safety defects”, “problem investigation”, “designing actions including human factors considerations (initial and modifications)” and “testing”.
Tesla is in the middle of a massive reorganization and massive layoffs. The company did not disclose how many jobs in its autopilot engineering and vehicle safety teams might have been cut.
For about a decade, CEO Elon Musk has been promising that Tesla is on the verge of a breakthrough in autonomous driving. As sales of Tesla electric vehicles fell in the first quarter, Musk focused investors’ attention on his dream of a future full of Tesla AI products, including robo-taxis and “sentient” humanoid robots capable of to carry out work in a factory.
You’re here Shares fell 3.8% Tuesday to $177.81 and are down 28% in 2024.
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