The driver in a double-fatal crash of a Tesla had a blood-alcohol content of 0.21 percent at the time her car crashed and burned in Indianapolis in November 2016.
The driver in a double-fatal crash of a Tesla had a blood-alcohol content of 0.21 percent at the time her car crashed and burned in Indianapolis in November 2016.
The early morning crash killed driver Casey Speckman, 27, and passenger Kevin McCarthy, 44, when the Tesla electric car hit a tree and crashed into a building.
McCarthy was the owner of the Model S but was not driving, and had a blood-alcohol content of 0.17 percent at the time of the crash, the Associated Press reports.
Indiana's legal drinking and driving limit is 0.08 percent.
Most of the talk at the time of the crash revolved around the role Tesla's Autopilot semi-autonomous feature played in the fiery crash. Tesla told MLive in November that it was unlikely its Autopilot was engaged at the time of the wreck as it would have limited the car's speed to 35 mph on the street where the crash occurred.
In the crash, debris was scattered more than 150 yards, and multiple fires made it difficult to extricate the two passengers, the Indianapolis Fire Department reported in November.
"We are deeply saddened to hear that this accident involved fatalities and have been working with authorities to offer our full cooperation," a Tesla spokesperson told MLive in November. "Due to the damaged caused by the collision, the car was physically incapable of transmitting log data to our servers.
"However, had Autopilot been engaged it would have limited the vehicle's speed to less than 35 mph on this street, which is inconsistent with witness statements and the damage sustained."
A.P. reports that police have not released how fast the car was going before hitting the tree and building. The California-based electric vehicle maker's Autopilot autonomous feature came under fire in media coverage and by federal regulators after a fatal crash in Florida in May 2016.
Tesla Motors Inc. avoided a recall or fine after a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration probe into a fatal crash involving the company's Autopilot system regarding the Florida fatal wreck.
The driver, Joshua Brown, of a Tesla Model S suffered fatal injuries after colliding with a tractor-trailer while "crossing an uncontrolled intersection," federal documents read.
Tesla said in a statement at the time that in bright sunlight, neither the autopilot nor driver noticed the white side of the trailer.
Neither the autopilot nor driver applied the brakes in the crash. Brown's Tesla S crashed beneath the truck, went off the road and crashed into several barriers on a highway near Gainesville, Florida.
The automaker updated the Autopilot program to prevent it from engaging when the vehicle goes 5 mph faster than the posted speed limit. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has defended the program by calling it an advanced safety feature, while lambasting the media coverage of his company's crashes.
"I mean one of the things I should mention that frankly has been quite disturbing to me is the degree of media coverage of Autopilot crashes," he said at a October 2016 press conferences, "which are basically almost none, relative to the porosity of media coverage of the 1.2 million people that die every year in manual crashes."
The Autopilot system was introduced in 2015, and can take over for the car at a set speed and make sure it doesn't drift out of its lane. Drivers are required to touch the wheel at certain times to keep it from shutting off, A.P. reports.