Mainstream US media has reported that hundreds of Teslas have been involved in automobile accidents, providing a tally of crashes that exceeds previously reported numbers.
The US media insisted in an article published Saturday that there were “736 US crashes since 2019 involving Teslas in Autopilot mode,” a number which it claims is “far more than previously reported.”
“The number of such crashes has surged over the past four years,” the outlet maintains.
The outlet wrote that the figure reflects what they called the “hazards” related to the “increasingly widespread use of Tesla’s futuristic driver-assistance technology as well as the growing presence of the cars on the nation’s roadways.”
As the number of Teslas driven across the globe has exploded over the past several years, “the number of deaths and serious injuries associated with Autopilot also has grown significantly,” the outlet said.
“When authorities first released a partial accounting of accidents involving Autopilot in June 2022, they counted only three deaths definitively linked to the technology,” the paper wrote, adding that, now, “the most recent data includes at least 17 fatal incidents, 11 of them since last May, and five serious injuries."
The report further claimed the vehicular fatalities “reveal distinct patterns” because “four involved a motorcycle” and one “involved an emergency vehicle.”
The outlet charges that “some of Musk’s decisions… appear to have contributed to the reported uptick in incidents.”
When challenged on the issue, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has referred to crash rate data that indicates cars using in Tesla’s Autopilot mode are safer than those being driven by humans.