{"source":"NHTSA vehicle owner complaint","officialApiUrl":"https://api.nhtsa.gov/complaints/odinumber?odinumber=11447934","retrievedAt":"2026-11-05T05:18:06.403Z","count":1,"results":[{"odiNumber":11447934,"manufacturer":"Tesla, Inc.","crash":false,"fire":false,"numberOfInjuries":0,"numberOfDeaths":0,"dateOfIncident":"01/14/2022","dateComplaintFiled":"01/18/2022","vin":"5YJ3E1EB4NF","components":"FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE","summary":"I took delivery of my Tesla Model 3 in mid December and have have driven approximately 2,000 miles, almost all highway commute miles. I have had horrible experiences with the Autopilot cruise control slamming on the brakes for no apparent reason. Nothing in front of the vehicle, sometimes nothing around the vehicle at all. Behavior is sometimes a quick deceleration of 10 mph or so; however, in some cases FULL brake is applied, coupled with an audible collision warming. Again, these things are happening with NOTHING present in front of my vehicle, and sometimes with nothing around me at all. During my daily commutes, I experience, on average, 5 to 10 instances of this unsafe slowing/stopping procedure. In one instance, the vehicle decelerated from 64mph down to 37mph, for no reason, with a line of other vehicles following me. We narrowly avoided a multi-vehicle collision, caused by a completely unnecessary braking application. Needless to say, as the line of cars passed me, each of the other drivers were very unhappy with me, probably assuming I had “brake checked” them, considering there was no one in front of me and no reason to quickly decelerate from 64mph to 37mph. Had they been following closer or not paying attention we surely would have all be involved in a collision. I reported the issue to Tesla and was told “the vehicle detected a ghost object…This is currently a normal characteristic of autopilot…” There is no other “normal” cruise control feature on the vehicle, it’s either use Autopilot and risk being involved in a collision, or drive the vehicle myself (which defeats the purpose of purchasing the vehicle for commute reasons). Very unhappy that Tesla did not offer to even look into my issue, considering it’s not an occasional problem, it occurs several times per commute trip,","products":[{"type":"Vehicle","productYear":"2022","productMake":"TESLA","productModel":"MODEL 3","manufacturer":"Tesla, Inc."}]}]}