Tesla Autopilot: Model S That Hit 5 Cars Started Itself, Owner Says

Update: 7:12 a.m. EDT – According to StreetInsider.com, Tesla has said the Brussels car accident did not involve the car’s Autopilot system. This was also tweeted out by London–based global equity strategist Stéphane Ekolo.

Original story:

According to a local report in Belgium, an owner of a Tesla Model S claimed it started on its own, without a driver, and drove into five other cars in the municipality of Saint-Gilles, Brussels.

The news website Sudinfo.be described the incident that occurred late Tuesday as “incroyable,” literally meaning incredible in French.

The article said the strange journey, explained by the owner to the police, met its end with a Dacia Logan across the street. It is unclear if there were any injuries and as to what the extent of damages were.

This comes on the back of the fact that on Tuesday morning a Tesla Model S running on Autopilot mode crashed into a parked police vehicle in Laguna Beach, California, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times.

Laguna Police Sgt. Jim Cota explained the collision happened at 20652 Laguna Canyon Road and said “Thankfully there was not an officer at the time in the police car.”

However, “the police car is totalled,” Cota added. The driver sustained minor injuries. “Why do these vehicles keep doing that?” Cota further said pointing out another collision that occurred in the area about a year ago, when a Tesla ran into a semi-truck. “We’re just lucky that people aren’t getting injured.”

The Autopilot driver-assist feature has been under public scrutiny in recent times following a string of incidents/accidents.

Earlier this month, a Tesla electric car running in its semi-autonomous Autopilot mode rammed into the back of a fire truck in Utah. The driver told police in Salt Lake City that she was looking at her phone and had the Autopilot system switched on when it happened, the LA Times reported.

In an incident that occurred in March, it was found that a Model X driver, who died in a highway crash in California, had the Autopilot feature on at the time of the accident. Tesla defended the safety of their driver-assistance system at the time saying "the driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive."

Computer logs revealed driver Wei Huang, 38, didn’t have his hands on the wheel for six seconds prior colliding with a highway barricade. The driver had "about five seconds and 150 meters of unobstructed view" of the concrete divider coupled with an already-crushed crash cushion his vehicle collided with, Tesla said. "But the vehicle logs show that no action was taken," they added.

On Wednesday, Consumer Reports (CR) did an about-face on a scathing review they had done last week that showed the Tesla Model 3 had failed their tests and so CR could not recommend it.

Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk vowed to get it fixed in a few days with a software update -- an update came this week. New tests revealed “our testers found that a recent over-the-air (OTA) update improved the car’s braking distance by almost 20 feet.”

“The Tesla’s stopping distance of 152 feet from 60 mph was far worse than any contemporary car we’ve tested and about 7 feet longer than the stopping distance of a Ford F-150 full-sized pickup,” last week’s denial of recommendation of the magazine said.

“In retesting after the software update was downloaded, the sedan stopped in 133 feet from 60 mph, an improvement of 19 feet,” Wednesday’s CR recommendation read.

A New York Post report stated that Tesla's shares went up 3.3 percent to $293.15 following CR's recommendation.

This is a developing story.