Two teenagers in a rented Tesla Model 3 crashed into police, accusing the autopilot
The two girls, aged 14 and 15, were said to have driven about 300 miles before being arrested and taken to the Florida Department of Children and Families for driving without a license.
Two young people from Palm Coast, Florida got into trouble after riding a Tesla Model 3 rented and hit a police car. And as if driving without a license wasn't enough, the Flagler County Sheriff's Office reports that When they arrived, there was something else missing from the car: a man in the driver's seat..
According to the sheriff's office, a deputy attempted a traffic stop on a 3 Tesla Model 2018 last Friday. He observed a vehicle leave the Wawa gas station shortly before 10:300 a.m. and begin driving on the wrong side of the road. The vehicle came to a stop and then struck the officer's cruiser again, causing $XNUMX worth of damage to the Tesla.
The policeman got out of the car and called tenants, two minor girls aged 14 and 15who were allegedly sitting in the front passenger seat and in the back seat when he arrived. To be very clear, according to the police report, there were no people in the driver's seat when the police officer came into contact with the teenagers.
The teenage girls reportedly told the officer that Tesla "driving only in autopilot mode" as he backed toward the patrol. After some interrogation, both teenagers stated that after activating the autopilot, there was no one in the driver's seat. However, one of the minors later changed her story and said that her friend got into the back seat only after the car drove into the wrong lane.
In any case, accusing Tesla of Level 2 driver assistance doesn't seem like a likely excuse given that autopilot usually works in a far-sighted direction. A Tesla forum post from 2019 may explain what happened: the vehicle could be accidentally put into reverse when attempting to disengage the autopilot.
The autopilot controls on the Model 3 and Model Y are located on the shift lever to the right of the steering column. Assuming the girls are telling the truth, it's possible that the teenager controlling Tesla's functions tried to press the control button on the device to turn off the autopilot, and instead of parking the car, mistakenly pressed the control button down, up, and put the car in reverse twice.
The teens reportedly drove over 300 miles. Police said the teens rented a car using car-sharing app Turo. and he was taken to one of their homes in Charleston, South Carolina. The teens arrived in Palm Coast, Florida on their way to visit one of their parents. When police contacted the mother of the teenager who was driving, she said she did not know her daughter had left the state and another daughter had allegedly provided officers with false information about her parents.
Police charged one of the teens with driving without a license because there was no stock self-driving car, and placed both girls in the care of the Florida Department of Children and Families until their parents could pick them up. The officer's reversed report also states that a pepper spray can and a "plastic bag containing a green leaf substance" identified as marijuana were seized..
“These girls are very lucky that no one was hurt and their actions did not have more serious consequences,” Sheriff Rick Staley said in a statement. “It doesn't matter if you drive a smart car, driving without a license is still illegal. I hope these girls have learned a valuable lesson, and I'm grateful that no one was hurt and their car only received minimal damage."
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