A driver who once worked for Revel, a ride-share company, has blamed Tesla for the unintended acceleration of its EV. He's suing Tesla since he says the vehicle he was driving took off suddenly and unintentionally, which caused him to crash the car.
This is one of many mounting claims against Tesla for unintended acceleration. However, thus far, it has been proven time and time again that the driver was at fault. Almost indefinitely, the driver never pushed the brake pedal, but pressed hard on the accelerator pedal by mistake. It's gone so far that regulators in China have demanded Tesla push an over-the-air update to add new safety features.
Tesla's EVs, much like most electric cars, have regenerative braking systems that allow the driver to drive with only one pedal: the accelerator. The regulators in China believe this greatly increases the chances that a driver would slam on the accelerator when aiming to slam on the brake pedal. The regulators have asked Tesla to allow the one-pedal driving feature to be manually turned off and to show alerts in the car when and if a driver presses hard on the accelerator pedal.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) looked into over 200 reported Tesla crash incidents reportedly involving unintended acceleration. The organization found that all the incidents were a result of human error. The drivers accidentally used the accelerator pedal in an attempt to stop the car.
With that said, this former Revel driver claims it wasn't his mistake. Akm Shamsuzzaman filed a suit with the New York State Supreme Court stating that on January 29, 2023, the Tesla vehicle he was driving "jumped forward" on its own. As shared by Teslarati, his lawyer told Business Insider:
“He had his foot on the brake. He put the car into drive, took his foot off the brake, and then the car jumped forward."
The former Revel employee claims that once he took his foot off the Tesla's brake pedal, he lost control of the EV. He says that even after he put his foot back down on the brake pedal, the car was still out of his control, he couldn't stop it or put it into park, so he had to crash it on purpose to avoid hitting pedestrians. The lawyer added:
“He had to crash the car to get it to stop."
Thankfully, the driver wasn't injured, and no one else was involved in the incident. He's seeking undetermined damages due to the incident.
