A Tesla Model X owner has sued Tesla Motors Inc. on allegations that his electric SUV suddenly accelerated while he was parking it in his garage. The vehicle reportedly jolted forward and crashed into his home.
The owner Ji Chang Son filed the complaint on Friday, Dec. 30 in the U.S. District Court in the Central District of California. The incident allegedly took place back in September.
Son recounted that he was carefully pulling into his driveway, with his garage door opening, when the car suddenly sped forward.
"The vehicle spontaneously began to accelerate at full power, jerking forward, and crashing through the interior wall of the garage, destroying several wooden support beams in the wall and a steel sewer pipe, among other things, and coming to rest in plaintiffs' living room," the lawsuit claims.
The driver and his passenger at the time were both injured.
This is also not the only Model X reportedly with a sudden acceleration problem, since the lawsuit is seeking class action status. There were seven other complaints, registered in a database of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), which made the same allegations against the company regarding the sudden acceleration.
Similar Allegations Filed Against Tesla Motors
A few months ago, transportation website Electrek published an article reporting other cases of Model X units suddenly jetting off.
Tesla asserted it has reviewed the logs from each incident, and concluded that it was the driver's fault. The Elon Musk company claims its cars "do not accelerate without the driver instructing it to do so."
By checking such customer claims, the electric vehicle manufacturer confirmed through diagnostic logs that the incidents of sudden acceleration occurred because of the driver actually using the accelerator pedal. The same is true in the case of Son who, Tesla claims, pressed the pedal "all the way to 100 percent."
The EV maker also cited evidence from an independent source who happens to own one of the vehicles in question.
Independent Source Backs Tesla's Claim
Jason Hughes bought a Tesla Model X that was named in one of the claims. He found saved footage stored in the electric vehicle's autopilot camera system then compared the clip to images of an incident involving the car.
After crosschecking the evidence, Hughes continued to review the logs and was able to conclude that the accelerator pedal had been used instead of the brake.
However, Hughes' findings cannot be used to examine the particulars of all the cases in question. Some of the owners also contest Tesla's claim and have raised the possibility that the cause may have been a sensor error instead, Inquisitr notes.
