Tesla recalls 2m cars
Tesla is recalling about two million cars in the US fitted with its Autopilot advanced driver-assistance system.
The company will install new safeguards after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said the system was open to “foreseeable misuse”.
The agency has been investigating Tesla for more than two years over whether its electric vehicles (EVs) adequately ensure owners pay attention when using Autopilot.
Elon Musk’s company states in the recall filing that Autopilot’s software system controls “may not be sufficient to prevent driver misuse” and could increase the risk of an accident.
The company has not responded to a question on whether the recall would be performed outside the US.
Acting NHTSA administrator, Ann Carlson, told Reuters in August that it was “really important that driver-monitoring systems take into account that humans over-trust technology”.
Autopilot is intended to enable cars to steer, accelerate and brake automatically in their lane. Enhanced Autopilot can assist in changing lanes on highways but does not make them autonomous.
One component of Autopilot is Autosteer. It maintains a set speed or following distance and works to keep a vehicle in its driving lane.
Tesla doesn’t concur with the NHTSA’s analysis. However, it will deploy an over-the-air software update that will “incorporate additional controls and alerts to those already existing on affected vehicles to further encourage the driver to adhere to their continuous driving responsibility whenever Autosteer is engaged”.
The NHTSA opened an investigation into Autopilot in August 2021 after identifying more than a dozen crashes in which Teslas hit stationary emergency vehicles and upgraded it in June 2022.
As a result of that, it says Tesla issued the recall after the agency found the “unique design of its Autopilot system can provide inadequate driver engagement and usage controls that can lead to foreseeable misuse of the system”.
Since 2016, the NHTSA has also opened more than three dozen Tesla special crash investigations in cases where driver systems, such as Autopilot, were suspected of being used with 23 accident deaths reported to date.
The agency says there might be an increased risk of a crash in situations when the system is engaged but the driver does not maintain responsibility for vehicle operation and is unprepared to intervene or fails to recognise when it’s cancelled or not, reports The Guardian.
The NHTSA’s investigation into Autopilot will remain open as it monitors the efficacy of Tesla’s remedies.
Tesla will roll out the update to 2.03 million Model S, X, 3 and Y vehicles in the US dating back to the 2012 model year, the agency says.
The update based on vehicle hardware will include increasing prominence of visual alerts on the user interface, simplifying engagement and disengagement of Autosteer and extra checks upon engaging Autosteer.
Also, there will be “eventual suspension from Autosteer use if the driver repeatedly fails to demonstrate continuous and sustained driving responsibility while the feature is engaged”, states Tesla.
Tesla disclosed in October that the US justice department had issued subpoenas related to its full self-driving (FSD) and Autopilot systems. Reuters reported in October 2022 that the company was under investigation over claims the company’s EVs could drive themselves.
In February, the company recalled 362,000 US vehicles to update its FSD beta software after the NHTSA said the vehicles did not adequately adhere to traffic-safety laws and could cause crashes. The agency closed an earlier investigation into Autopilot in 2017 without taking any action.
