A California driver says his Tesla began to malfunction while driving on the freeway, forcing him to cruise a freeway at 83 mph without being able to control his accelerator pedal.
Javier Rodriguez, an Irvine resident, told KABC in Los Angeles that his Tesla Model 3’s computer froze while driving on Interstate 10 — rendering the Tesla’s center touchscreen unusable but also causing the turn signals to stop flashing , hazard lights and other standard car functions stopped working.
“I noticed the car was getting hot and there was a strange smell,” Rodriguez told the news channel.
While the brakes were still working, Rodriguez told KABC he was worried he wouldn’t be able to accelerate if he slowed down.
“I was nervous that someone would ram me,” he said.
And although he was successfully pulled to the curb with the help of a California Highway Patrol officer and towed to have his car repaired, Rodriguez said Tesla didn’t give him many details about his car’s malfunction.
Tesla said in its report that the cause of the car freezing was “poor communication from the charge port door that caused the power conversion system to shut down,” Rodriguez told KABC.
Some Tesla Model 3 owners have reported outages and other issues with their vehicles’ power conversion system. In 2019, some vehicles had “service request” pop-ups on their screen due to “unexpected conditions” affecting the power conversion system.
KABC tried to reach Tesla’s PR team – which was quietly disbanded in 2020.