U.S. opens formal safety probe into Tesla Autopilot crashes

[August 16, 2021]  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. auto safety regulators said early Monday they have opened a formal safety probe into Tesla Inc's driver assistance system Autopilot after a series of crashes.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said that since January 2018, it has identified 11 crashes in which Tesla models "have encountered first responder scenes and subsequently struck one or more vehicles involved with those scenes." NHTSA said it has opened a preliminary evaluation of Autopilot in 2014-2021 Tesla Models Y, X, S, and 3.

NHTSA has in recent years sent numerous special crash investigation teams to review a series of individual Tesla crashes.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Giles Elgood)

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