Verified government source

NHTSA complaint #11430930

This page summarizes an official U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration owner complaint. Use the verification links below to confirm the record directly with NHTSA.

Vehicle

2021 TESLA MODEL 3

Manufacturer

Tesla, Inc.

Components

STEERING,VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL,SERVICE BRAKES

Dates

Incident: 08/22/2021
Filed: 08/29/2021

Owner complaint summary

I was pulling up next to a curb inside a neighborhood to park my car. I released my foot on the accelerator pedal to slow and stop my car. I slowly stepped on the brake pedal to switch the gear into reverse and my vehicle sped up very fast and hit the parked car in front of me and ran over the curb, my steering wheel also shifted to the right as if it was trying to dodge an obstacle on the road. It happpend so fast that I could not avoid the impact. I could have ran into a pedestrian and put their life at risk, or injured the person in the car that was parked, and even hurt myself badly. I've been getting neck pain and headaches. This incident was very terrifying and traumatizing. I tried to reach out to Tesla Service Center, but my tesla app was not working after the incident. The Tesla app was frozen for 10-15 mins after the incident. I kept trying to reach out to Tesla Service center and kept getting an automated response to utilize the Tesla App. Finally, the app started working again, I left them a message regarding the accident and photos, and they responded two days after, but did not address the issue about unintended acceleration until I kept asking why are they ignoring my concerns about the uninteded accerlation, and then I received a phone call from a technician. He said that I do not have to bring my car for inspection, instead they will just check the logs and could take up to 8 weeks to see what happened. Estimated cost for exterior damages according to Geico Insurance is 5344.74. Tesla Service Center denied having the car inspected physcially for any sensor issues and malfunction issues, states that I don't have to bring my car in at all, they will submit a report for engineering team to review the driving logs at the time of the accident only. My car is currently towed to a 3rd party body shop that is Tesla certified. No warnings from my car screen alerts or anything prior to the accident.

Crash reported
This is an owner complaint filed with NHTSA (ODI #11430930). It is not automatically an official recall, investigation outcome, or manufacturer admission unless the complaint text itself describes one.

Official record ID (ODI): 11430930. This page is the human-readable source link used across afterwarranty. The raw JSON link proxies NHTSA's public API for machine verification; prefer this page when reading the complaint.