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2015 Tesla Accelerated into a wall

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I've done something kind of similar on a CVT motorcycle. You start going forward unexpectedly and for some bizarre reason the surprise of going forward you just max out whatever control you are currently focused on. In this case the throttle. I went full throttle for about 2-3 seconds terrified that I wasn't stopping before I realized what was happening. Then obviously I stopped fine using the brakes. I get how the accident happened, although I don't get not believing the truth afterwards
 
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I did a fun experiment today. The result surprised me. Remember what they say “don’t try this at home”.

1) With foot on the brake, car in D, open door, cars shifts to park.

2) (surprise!) found a little hill for this test, so I could be giving it some juice but barely moving. With foot on the accelerator (lightly!!!), car in D, open door. Cars stays in Drive, even after foot is removed from accelerator.

Short answer, scenario described does not need a defect in the seat or door safeties if the accelerator was being pressed.

Only question in my mind is why the car doesn’t shift to park if door is opened with brake on but not when accelerator is on. Is this the “bail out” mode like in the movies?
 
I did a fun experiment today. The result surprised me. Remember what they say “don’t try this at home”.

1) With foot on the brake, car in D, open door, cars shifts to park.

2) (surprise!) found a little hill for this test, so I could be giving it some juice but barely moving. With foot on the accelerator (lightly!!!), car in D, open door. Cars stays in Drive, even after foot is removed from accelerator.

Short answer, scenario described does not need a defect in the seat or door safeties if the accelerator was being pressed.

Only question in my mind is why the car doesn’t shift to park if door is opened with brake on but not when accelerator is on. Is this the “bail out” mode like in the movies?

It should shift to park if you get out of the seat, regardless of anything else. Did you try that?

Folks who like to look over their shoulder when backing up have tripped it occasionally by shifting enough that the seat weight sensor decides they are getting up.
 
What happens if you think you are setting the turn signal and accidently pull on the cruise control lever? Will the car accelerate? I have not tried this myself but I have done something similar while cruising. I found myself having to shut off TACC or rapidly press the brake. Caught me by surprise but I immediately knew what I did. When you are not paying attention and not used to the cars lever positions, they feel very similar in position and style IMHO.

And if that does engage the cruise control then you panic and hit the accelerator thinking you were stepping on the brake because you knew you did not press the accelerator?

Just wondering. It seems like all (most?) of these unintended accelerations happen to newbies.
 
What happens if you think you are setting the turn signal and accidently pull on the cruise control lever? Will the car accelerate? I have not tried this myself but I have done something similar while cruising. I found myself having to shut off TACC or rapidly press the brake. Caught me by surprise but I immediately knew what I did. When you are not paying attention and not used to the cars lever positions, they feel very similar in position and style IMHO.

And if that does engage the cruise control then you panic and hit the accelerator thinking you were stepping on the brake because you knew you did not press the accelerator?

Just wondering. It seems like all (most?) of these unintended accelerations happen to newbies.

Again, TACC will not engage below 18 mph unless it think it sees a car in front of you - and won't accelerate if it sees a car in front of you.
 
Salvage title = "Does it even have airbags?"
If it didnt have ay
What happens if you think you are setting the turn signal and accidently pull on the cruise control lever? Will the car accelerate? I have not tried this myself but I have done something similar while cruising. I found myself having to shut off TACC or rapidly press the brake. Caught me by surprise but I immediately knew what I did. When you are not paying attention and not used to the cars lever positions, they feel very similar in position and style IMHO.

And if that does engage the cruise control then you panic and hit the accelerator thinking you were stepping on the brake because you knew you did not press the accelerator?

Just wondering. It seems like all (most?) of these unintended accelerations happen to newbies.

I had a loaner 2018 75d last week and I can confirm that when i inadvertently hit the cruise instead of the turn signal the car did speed up when pulling into a parking lot. I was able to quickly apply the brakes but since my S is a 2013 my turn and cruise levers are reversed.
 
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I am still used to my old 2014 with the turn signal lower on the steering column and occasionally add 5 MPH to my speed when hitting the cruise lever instead of the turn signal lever on my 2015.

But since all CC is TACC on the 2015, it won't rear-end the driver in front, even if I were to be drafting at Daytona 500 distances (and I don't do that, I usually have my TACC follow set to 3 or 4).

Unless both the camera and radar fail simultaneously. Then all bets are off.
 
It should shift to park if you get out of the seat, regardless of anything else. Did you try that?

Folks who like to look over their shoulder when backing up have tripped it occasionally by shifting enough that the seat weight sensor decides they are getting up.

It only shifts into park at low speeds. Above a certain speed (don’t remember what that is), the car remains in Drive if you lift your body off the seat.

This “safety” feature was added to address the situation where a person is backing up with the door open to grab a paper in the driveway while backing out. Apparently people were doing this and sometimes fell out of the car while attempting to grab the newspaper.
 
Remember when Audi’s were having this issue back in the early 90’s? The drivers all swore and were all convinced they had their foot on the brake as they proceded to ram other cars or go through store fronts. These stories dominated the media with sensational BS.... until the “little black-box” confirmed that ALL of them were mistaken, they all had their foot on the accelerator. Hell, when I asked my wife if she had her foot on the brake a few months ago, she asked to my chagrin, “Which one is that?” .... YIKES! o_O
 
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That's from that thread, last page...

It's so hard... soooo hard..... I don't think you'd understand unless you were there. We are both 50+ years old. NOTHING like this has ever happened to us. It's so easy to blame the car. In my head I understand all the explanations out there and I think they're reasonable. But in my heart.... Oh god I want so bad for it to be Tesla's fault....

My son put it best: "This is a goddamn mess".

Progressive just decided on the pictures to total the car. The next step is for them to decide how much it's worth...

While I sympathize with your problems with the car, I don't see how this can be "Tesla's fault," given you have a repaired salvage car that was not recertified by Tesla. I am just not sure how you will ever figure out what really happened here. Good luck!
 
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I'm really sorry that this has to be my first post on this forum. I've been lurking outside of Tesla for years, afraid that if I joined in I'd get too involved and overextend myself trying to afford one... I'd been saving for seven years and finally had enough money put together to outright purchase a used 2015 Tesla Model S 85. Great car, we owned and enjoyed it for five days and then...

My wife was driving, in a parking lot, turning into a spot to park and get out, when the Tesla started accelerating on it's own! She stood on the brakes trying to get it to stop, but it would not, so she steered it to try to control as it accelerated and finally crashed into the side of the building. Even afterwards, when my wife was out of the car and the police and tow truck was there, the car was STILL trying to drive forwards.

The police were not too familiar with a Tesla so they did not know how to turn if off. My wife kept telling them "you have to walk away from the car" meaning take the fob away so the car will turn off. They took the fob all the way to the other side of the parking lot but the car would not turn off. They got into the car and found the menu option to turn it off, but it immediately turned back on and started trying to move forward again. When I arrived, I told them about the "fireman disconnect" wire on the front left side of the car (BTW Thank you to the forum about this! I had just learned about it the other day from a thread here when I was researching features on the 2015 Model S). The firemen had to use the "jaws of life" to pry up the hood (it drove *into* the building through a brick wall. My wife said it was going nearly 40 mph by the time it hit). Anyway, once they got the hood popped they cut that wire and the car finally stopped moving.

I thought I'd search the forum before posting this and found a bunch of posts so similar! In fact one was so much like mine:
Sudden Unexpected Acceleration today I want to try to answer some anticipated replies:

Creep mode was on. My wife said she just took her foot off the brake and let creep mode move the car into the spot. At that time the car started accelerating on its own, she never touched a pedal. She remembers signalling her intention to turn into the spot so it's possible she accidentally engaged the auto pilot, she doesn't remember.

When the car started accelerating she put BOTH feet on the brake. She clearly remembers putting both feet on the brake and nearly standing up she was pressing so hard. So I don't believe she touched the accelerator at all.

I'm not posting here to bash the Tesla. I still love the car and I'd buy another one. I'm posting to ask some questions:

1. Why didn't the car stop when it detected something in front of it (like a brick wall)? Isn't there some sort of auto stop feature in the Tesla? I really don't know the features of the car that well.

2. Why would the car continue to try to accelerate after she left the vehicle? Why wouldn't it shut off? Why did it turn back on again when the police officer found the "Shut off" command in the menu?

3. Here's the question that will make all of you blame me: This is a salvage/previously totaled car that was repaired. It was purposely disconnected from Tesla so it wouldn't be blacklisted (I got this info from the private party I bought the car from). Do you know if Tesla will be able to extract the logs to find out what happened even though it's been "blocked"?
I'm really sorry that this has to be my first post on this forum. I've been lurking outside of Tesla for years, afraid that if I joined in I'd get too involved and overextend myself trying to afford one... I'd been saving for seven years and finally had enough money put together to outright purchase a used 2015 Tesla Model S 85. Great car, we owned and enjoyed it for five days and then...

My wife was driving, in a parking lot, turning into a spot to park and get out, when the Tesla started accelerating on it's own! She stood on the brakes trying to get it to stop, but it would not, so she steered it to try to control as it accelerated and finally crashed into the side of the building. Even afterwards, when my wife was out of the car and the police and tow truck was there, the car was STILL trying to drive forwards.

The police were not too familiar with a Tesla so they did not know how to turn if off. My wife kept telling them "you have to walk away from the car" meaning take the fob away so the car will turn off. They took the fob all the way to the other side of the parking lot but the car would not turn off. They got into the car and found the menu option to turn it off, but it immediately turned back on and started trying to move forward again. When I arrived, I told them about the "fireman disconnect" wire on the front left side of the car (BTW Thank you to the forum about this! I had just learned about it the other day from a thread here when I was researching features on the 2015 Model S). The firemen had to use the "jaws of life" to pry up the hood (it drove *into* the building through a brick wall. My wife said it was going nearly 40 mph by the time it hit). Anyway, once they got the hood popped they cut that wire and the car finally stopped moving.

I thought I'd search the forum before posting this and found a bunch of posts so similar! In fact one was so much like mine:
Sudden Unexpected Acceleration today I want to try to answer some anticipated replies:

Creep mode was on. My wife said she just took her foot off the brake and let creep mode move the car into the spot. At that time the car started accelerating on its own, she never touched a pedal. She remembers signalling her intention to turn into the spot so it's possible she accidentally engaged the auto pilot, she doesn't remember.

When the car started accelerating she put BOTH feet on the brake. She clearly remembers putting both feet on the brake and nearly standing up she was pressing so hard. So I don't believe she touched the accelerator at all.

I'm not posting here to bash the Tesla. I still love the car and I'd buy another one. I'm posting to ask some questions:

1. Why didn't the car stop when it detected something in front of it (like a brick wall)? Isn't there some sort of auto stop feature in the Tesla? I really don't know the features of the car that well.

2. Why would the car continue to try to accelerate after she left the vehicle? Why wouldn't it shut off? Why did it turn back on again when the police officer found the "Shut off" command in the menu?

3. Here's the question that will make all of you blame me: This is a salvage/previously totaled car that was repaired. It was purposely disconnected from Tesla so it wouldn't be blacklisted (I got this info from the private party I bought the car from). Do you know if Tesla will be able to extract the logs to find out what happened even though it's been "blocked"?

Same thing happened to me.
On Friday, March 15th at 1:05pm - coming home from Costco, came up the hill to my home, took my foot off the accelerator, car slows down as it always does (creep mode), getting ready to park it in front of the garage and touched the brake to put it in park. It accelerated so fast through the garage into the house. The car finally stopped by the wall it hit, I put it in park but the tires were still rotating; stopped when I opened the door and then motors then shut down.
Tesla would not return my calls until about one month later after posting all over facebook; also reported it to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). If you want to contact me, my email is [email protected].
How many people have to get hurt or killed by these malfunctions that Tesla will not acknowledge and always blame the driver?
Don't let all the bashing from people on this site bother you.
 

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I'm really sorry that this has to be my first post on this forum. I've been lurking outside of Tesla for years, afraid that if I joined in I'd get too involved and overextend myself trying to afford one... I'd been saving for seven years and finally had enough money put together to outright purchase a used 2015 Tesla Model S 85. Great car, we owned and enjoyed it for five days and then...

My wife was driving, in a parking lot, turning into a spot to park and get out, when the Tesla started accelerating on it's own! She stood on the brakes trying to get it to stop, but it would not, so she steered it to try to control as it accelerated and finally crashed into the side of the building. Even afterwards, when my wife was out of the car and the police and tow truck was there, the car was STILL trying to drive forwards.

The police were not too familiar with a Tesla so they did not know how to turn if off. My wife kept telling them "you have to walk away from the car" meaning take the fob away so the car will turn off. They took the fob all the way to the other side of the parking lot but the car would not turn off. They got into the car and found the menu option to turn it off, but it immediately turned back on and started trying to move forward again. When I arrived, I told them about the "fireman disconnect" wire on the front left side of the car (BTW Thank you to the forum about this! I had just learned about it the other day from a thread here when I was researching features on the 2015 Model S). The firemen had to use the "jaws of life" to pry up the hood (it drove *into* the building through a brick wall. My wife said it was going nearly 40 mph by the time it hit). Anyway, once they got the hood popped they cut that wire and the car finally stopped moving.

I thought I'd search the forum before posting this and found a bunch of posts so similar! In fact one was so much like mine:
Sudden Unexpected Acceleration today I want to try to answer some anticipated replies:

Creep mode was on. My wife said she just took her foot off the brake and let creep mode move the car into the spot. At that time the car started accelerating on its own, she never touched a pedal. She remembers signalling her intention to turn into the spot so it's possible she accidentally engaged the auto pilot, she doesn't remember.

When the car started accelerating she put BOTH feet on the brake. She clearly remembers putting both feet on the brake and nearly standing up she was pressing so hard. So I don't believe she touched the accelerator at all.

I'm not posting here to bash the Tesla. I still love the car and I'd buy another one. I'm posting to ask some questions:

1. Why didn't the car stop when it detected something in front of it (like a brick wall)? Isn't there some sort of auto stop feature in the Tesla? I really don't know the features of the car that well.

2. Why would the car continue to try to accelerate after she left the vehicle? Why wouldn't it shut off? Why did it turn back on again when the police officer found the "Shut off" command in the menu?

3. Here's the question that will make all of you blame me: This is a salvage/previously totaled car that was repaired. It was purposely disconnected from Tesla so it wouldn't be blacklisted (I got this info from the private party I bought the car from). Do you know if Tesla will be able to extract the logs to find out what happened even though it's been "blocked"?
I'm really sorry that this has to be my first post on this forum. I've been lurking outside of Tesla for years, afraid that if I joined in I'd get too involved and overextend myself trying to afford one... I'd been saving for seven years and finally had enough money put together to outright purchase a used 2015 Tesla Model S 85. Great car, we owned and enjoyed it for five days and then...

My wife was driving, in a parking lot, turning into a spot to park and get out, when the Tesla started accelerating on it's own! She stood on the brakes trying to get it to stop, but it would not, so she steered it to try to control as it accelerated and finally crashed into the side of the building. Even afterwards, when my wife was out of the car and the police and tow truck was there, the car was STILL trying to drive forwards.

The police were not too familiar with a Tesla so they did not know how to turn if off. My wife kept telling them "you have to walk away from the car" meaning take the fob away so the car will turn off. They took the fob all the way to the other side of the parking lot but the car would not turn off. They got into the car and found the menu option to turn it off, but it immediately turned back on and started trying to move forward again. When I arrived, I told them about the "fireman disconnect" wire on the front left side of the car (BTW Thank you to the forum about this! I had just learned about it the other day from a thread here when I was researching features on the 2015 Model S). The firemen had to use the "jaws of life" to pry up the hood (it drove *into* the building through a brick wall. My wife said it was going nearly 40 mph by the time it hit). Anyway, once they got the hood popped they cut that wire and the car finally stopped moving.

I thought I'd search the forum before posting this and found a bunch of posts so similar! In fact one was so much like mine:
Sudden Unexpected Acceleration today I want to try to answer some anticipated replies:

Creep mode was on. My wife said she just took her foot off the brake and let creep mode move the car into the spot. At that time the car started accelerating on its own, she never touched a pedal. She remembers signalling her intention to turn into the spot so it's possible she accidentally engaged the auto pilot, she doesn't remember.

When the car started accelerating she put BOTH feet on the brake. She clearly remembers putting both feet on the brake and nearly standing up she was pressing so hard. So I don't believe she touched the accelerator at all.

I'm not posting here to bash the Tesla. I still love the car and I'd buy another one. I'm posting to ask some questions:

1. Why didn't the car stop when it detected something in front of it (like a brick wall)? Isn't there some sort of auto stop feature in the Tesla? I really don't know the features of the car that well.

2. Why would the car continue to try to accelerate after she left the vehicle? Why wouldn't it shut off? Why did it turn back on again when the police officer found the "Shut off" command in the menu?

3. Here's the question that will make all of you blame me: This is a salvage/previously totaled car that was repaired. It was purposely disconnected from Tesla so it wouldn't be blacklisted (I got this info from the private party I bought the car from). Do you know if Tesla will be able to extract the logs to find out what happened even though it's been "blocked"?
 
I'm a Forensic Investigator for Auto Electronics related matters. I have the Tesla download equipment and am a licensed Tesla crash data retrieval software user. I've investigated two other Model S cases where they allegedly experienced SUA similar to yours. In both those cases the crash data download (which is stored in the airbag ECU, NOT from the Tesla OTA logging data) indicated pre-crash data accelerator pedal position was at 100%, and brake pedal OFF. Pedal misapplication is a known contributor to SUA, as is floor mat entrapment (one of the cases above had evidence of entrapment). However, network or electronic faults/problems can report erroneous data. I recommend you have the data downloaded to see what that says and then decide if a deeper investigation is warranted. PM me if you'd like to discuss.
 
I did a fun experiment today. The result surprised me. Remember what they say “don’t try this at home”.

1) With foot on the brake, car in D, open door, cars shifts to park.

2) (surprise!) found a little hill for this test, so I could be giving it some juice but barely moving. With foot on the accelerator (lightly!!!), car in D, open door. Cars stays in Drive, even after foot is removed from accelerator.

Short answer, scenario described does not need a defect in the seat or door safeties if the accelerator was being pressed.

Only question in my mind is why the car doesn’t shift to park if door is opened with brake on but not when accelerator is on. Is this the “bail out” mode like in the movies?

It is my understanding that 2 of 3 things need to be met for the car to go into Park automatically:
1. Door Open
2. Driver seat belt not engaged
3. Seat sensor not triggered