Another Tesla Has Reportedly Hit a Parked Emergency Vehicle

Another Tesla, apparently using the driver-assisting Autopilot feature, hit an emergency vehicle this weekend, according to CNN.

Dean Mouhtaropoulos | Getty Images

Tesla's Autopilot program is already the subject of a probe by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which pointed out earlier this month that since January 2018, it had found 11 crashes in which Tesla vehicles "encountered first responder scenes and subsequently struck one or more vehicles involved with those scenes." In those, it said, there were 17 injuries and one death.

Per CNN, there were no serious injuries in the crash last Saturday, which the Florida Highway patrol reported took place just before 5:00 a.m. along Interstate 4 in Orlando. The Tesla narrowly avoided hitting a state trooper as he got out of his car to help a driver whose vehicle had broken down on the highway.

Related: Elon Musk Says Tesla's New Driver Assistance Software Is 'Not Great'

The left front of the Tesla Model 3 hit the side of the police cruiser, then the broken-down car in the travel lane, according to CNN, which cited the Florida Highway Patrol report's revelation that the driver said his Tesla was in Autopilot at the time.

The preliminary NHTSA evaluation focuses on Autopilot in Tesla Models Y, X, S and 3 made from 2014 to 2021. In total, the probe is looking at around 765,000 cars in America.

"Most incidents took place after dark and the crash scenes encountered included scene control measures such a first responder vehicle lights, flares, an illuminated arrow board, and road cones," said the Office of Defects Investigation in a summary of the preliminary probe. "The involved subject vehicles were all confirmed to have been engaged in either Autopilot or Traffic Aware Cruise Control during the approach to the crashes."