- the national highway traffic safety administration (nhtsa) announced last week that it's starting an investigation into consumer complaints about sudden unintended acceleration in tesla vehicles.
- tesla responded today with a statement accusing a short seller, someone speculating on tesla's stock prices, of having filed the petition with nhtsa—and in fact, cnbc reported this weekend, investor brian sparks did in fact file the petition with nhtsa.
- included in the investigation are 2012–2019 model s, 2016–2019 model x, and 2018–2019 model 3 cars.
on january 17, the national highway traffic safety administration (nhtsa) announced that it will investigate complaints from consumers stating that their tesla vehicles have suddenly accelerated without any input from the driver. today, tesla posted a reply to the news of the investigation titled "there is no 'unintended acceleration' in tesla vehicles," making it clear that the company's position is one of categorical denial.
in the post, tesla alleges that a short seller initiated the petition and asserting that telsa is transparent with nhtsa about these types of complaints.
"we investigate every single incident where the driver alleges to us that their vehicle accelerated contrary to their input, and in every case where we had the vehicle's data, we confirmed that the car operated as designed," the post reads.
it continues: "over the past several years, we discussed with nhtsa the majority of the complaints alleged in the petition. in every case we reviewed with them, the data proved the vehicle functioned properly."
car and driver has reached out to tesla for further clarification on what information its investigations may have yielded.
the petition was based on "127 consumer complaints to nhtsa involving 123 unique vehicles," according to the nhtsa announcement of the safety agency's investigation. it further said that the consumer complaints included reports of 110 crashes and 52 injuries.
on friday, cnbc reported that investor brian sparks filed the petition with nhtsa. according to cnbc, sparks is currently short-selling tesla stocks, so that part of tesla's statement appears accurate.
tesla and especially its ceo, elon musk, have had a fraught relationship with investors, frequently claiming that short sellers are deliberately betting against tesla's success.
sparks, cited in the cnbc story, said that he did an investigation on his own and filed the petition with nhtsa after learning about another person, a model 3 owner, who claimed her vehicle accelerated twice without her input on separate occasions.
the last major unintended-acceleration recall involved toyota and lexus vehicles. in 2009 and 2010, the automaker issued several recalls to fix a misplaced floor mat and a mechanical fault in the accelerator. in the 1980s, claims that certain audi vehicles accelerated suddenly resulted in nhtsa's finding that most of the cases were due to driver error.