Tesla chief Elon Musk, in an email exchange with the father of teenager Barrett Riley, who died in a Tesla crash in 2018, opened up about his own personal loss, saying there's nothing worse than losing a child.
As he empathised with the father James Riley, Musk wrote that he knows the pain of losing a child himself because he lost his own son – Nevada Alexander Musk – who died when he was 10 weeks old.
“My firstborn son died in my arms. I felt his last heartbeat," Musk wrote.
Expressing condolences to Riley, Musk said that he understands parents' concerns for teenage Tesla drivers and promised him to fulfil his request to tweak a computerised feature of Tesla cars to make it easier for parents to control their maximum speed.
“I’ve never asked for acknowledgement for anything in my life, but it would be nice to acknowledge that Barrett and Edgar’s loss led to the enhanced safety of others," Riley wrote.
According to Bloomberg, the series of emails is included in a Broward County Court filing that was submitted in December in the lawsuit filed by the family of another teen – Edgar Monserratt – who also died in the crash.
Edgar's family accused Musk of removing a speed limiter from its car.