Two Texas men are dead after a driverless Tesla crashed into a tree and burst into flames, according to police.
The accident happened at 11:25 p.m. local time on Saturday night in Spring, Texas, near Houston.
Harris County Precinct 4 Constable Mark Herman reported that a 2019 Tesla Model S, which was in self-driving mode, failed to negotiate a cul-de-sac curve while driving at a high speed. The vehicle then veered off the road and crashed into a tree before bursting into flames.
Deputies said that it took firefighters almost four hours and over 30,000 gallons of water to put out the fire because the vehicle’s battery kept reigniting. The firefighters even had to contact Tesla for advice on how to put out the fire.
“Normally when the fire department arrives, they have the vehicle fire in control in minutes, but this went on close to four hours,” Herman said.
When the crew finally put out the fire, deputies searched the vehicle and found two bodies. One was in the front passenger seat and the other was in the back seat. The victims were a 59-year-old man and a 69-year-old man.
Herman told reporters that investigators are absolutely sure “there was no one driving” the vehicle at the time of the crash.
“They are 100% certain that no one was in the driver seat driving that vehicle at the time of impact. They are positive,” Herman said. “Our investigators are trained. They handle collisions … they feel very confident just with the positioning of the bodies after the impact that there was no one driving that vehicle.”
The brother-in-law of one of the victims told KPRC-TV that the two passengers were best friends who had just gone out for a joyride.
He said his brother-in-law, who owned the vehicle, backed out of the driveway and likely hopped in the back seat, only to crash a few hundred yards down the road. He also said that relatives watched as deputies worked for hours to put out the fire.
Shortly before the accident, Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk tweeted new accident report data from the first quarter of 2021 allegedly showing that someone driving a Tesla with autopilot engaged is 10 times less likely to be in an accident than a driver manually operating an average vehicle.
I will never own any electoral powered car. The Battery’s acid is so strong it can eat through metal and concrete very fast. The Battery’s for telephone tower acid is so strong it will eat though Two ft. In less than ten minutes. That why you can only cross from Canada to USA at certain Entries. One of there favorite is tell we can send you through the Sewer that means the tunnel under the water. I know that is what they told me when I drove 18 wheel.
I forgot tell you when the Border portal tells you they are laughing there ass off at you.