‘The vehicle suddenly accelerated with our baby in it’: the terrifying truth about why Tesla’s cars keep crashing

>There’s more. Two years prior, the NHTSA had flagged something strange – something suspicious. In a separate report, it documented 16 cases in which Tesla vehicles crashed into stationary emergency vehicles. In each, autopilot disengaged “less than one second before impact” – far too little time for the driver to react. Critics warn that this behaviour could allow Tesla to argue in court that autopilot was not active at the moment of impact, potentially dodging responsibility.

>The YouTuber Mark Rober, a former engineer at Nasa, replicated this behaviour in an experiment on 15 March 2025. He simulated a range of hazardous situations, in which the Model Y performed significantly worse than a competing vehicle. The Tesla repeatedly ran over a crash-test dummy without braking. The video went viral, amassing more than 14m views within a few days.

>The real surprise came after the experiment. Fred Lambert, who writes for the blog Electrek, pointed out the same [autopilot disengagement](https://electrek.co/2025/03/17/tesla-fans-exposes-shadiness-defend-autopilot-crash/) that the NHTSA had documented. “**Autopilot appears to automatically disengage a fraction of a second before the impact as the crash becomes inevitable**,” Lambert noted.

Try this one neat trick to avoid legal issues!

This is a car that will collect every byte of data it can about you, but when it comes to liability during an accident it’s “whoops no data.”

Also, the section about door handles isn’t limited to just Tesla, but they set the lead by removing as many mechanical parts as possible. Even the Mach E is being recalled for “Electronic door latch failure” because someone wanted to get rid of rear door handles, safety clearly an afterthought. The trend of touchscreens and electronics Tesla started over physical buttons and locks is one of the main downgrades for modern cars that will hopefully be reversed quicker than it was introduced.