The Tesla Cybertruck has become a significant part of pop culture since its debut to the public last year, with its jarring futuristic design and advanced technology like autopilot. However, as was the case earlier this month, that autopilot feature does not always work as intended.
One Tesla Cybertruck owner took to social media to report a pretty horrible autopilot failure, where his vehicle leaped a curb and crashed directly into a light pole causing extensive damage to the car.
Oddly enough, the car owner actually commended Tesla for “engineering the best passive safety in the world,” which is quite ironic given that the car’s own technology led to the incident.
“Soooooo my @Tesla @cybertruck crashed into a curb and then a light post on v13.2.4. Thank you @Tesla for engineering the best passive safety in the world,” Jonathan Challinger said in a since-deleted post.
“I walked away without a scratch. It failed to merge out of a lane that was ending (there was no one on my left) and made no attempt to slow down or turn until it had already hit the curb.”
Challinger then took responsibility for not being attentive enough while the car was in autopilot.
“Big fail on my part, obviously. Don’t make the same mistake I did. Pay attention. It can happen. I follow Tesla and FSD pretty closely and haven’t heard of any accident on V13 at all before this happened. It is easy to get complacent now – don’t,” he wrote.
He then reached out to Tesla to share the incident data, though he was reluctant to do so because he didn’t want to give the “haters” any “material.”
“[Tesla AI], how do I make sure you have the data you need from this incident? Service center etc has been less than responsive on this,” Challinger wrote.
“I do have the dashcam footage. I want to get it out there as a PSA that it can happen, even on v13, but I’m hesitant because I don’t want the attention and I don’t want to give the bears/haters any material. Spread my message and help save others from the same fate or far worse.”
Despite Challinger’s wishes, the crash did indeed draw a lot of attention on social media.
“This my friends is why Tesla is ranked #1 in accident deaths,” one person wrote on X.
“Only in America would someone thank the richest man in the world for building him a faulty car that decides it wanted to mate with a lamppost,” someone else added.
“My car crashed itself but I walked away unscathed, thank you Elon!” another commenter said with sarcasm.
“There’s a cult of personality around Musk, and a cult of personality around Trump, and it’s not too surprising that they ended up merging into one unified cult,” another person wrote.
“If a Tesla truck attempted to end my life I would post the video not praise it. Battered women/men syndrome I guess,” someone else said.
“Cybertrucks are one of the most dangerous cars on the road,” another person pointed out.
Clearly, the incident sparked a lot of reactions.
About Kevin Harrish