Tesla has released the first six Model X SUVs, which the Canadian company says has a bioweapon defense mode as default.
During an event on Tuesday, Sept. 29, Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla Motors, handed over the keys of the first six cars to their owners. The latest electric car comes with a host of new features, which included a mode that will protect the car's occupants in the event of a chemical attack.
Musk revealed that Model X's air conditioning system has three modes: circulating air from outside the car's cabin, re-circulating air already inside the car's cabin and a "bioweapon defense mode."
The bioweapon defense mode can be activated by pushing a button on the car's dashboard. When in this mode, the air-conditioning system of the car produces positive pressure in the car and prevents outside air to enter the car's cabin.
"Model X is the world's cleanest SUV on the inside, too. The front fascia is designed with a functional duct that pushes air through the first true HEPA filter system available in an automobile allowing medical-grade air to fill the cabin, no matter what is going on outside," per Tesla.
While Tesla claims the new bioweapon defense mode will come handy in case there is a biological attack, some experts believe that the new mode is just a marketing stunt.
Gizmodo interviewed Colonel Randall Larsen, the Director of The Institute for Homeland Security and the National Security Advisor to the Center for Biosecurity of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, who laughed when he heard of the new mode in the Model X.
Musk revealed that the heating, ventilating and air-conditioning (HVAC) system of the Model X is 800 times efficient in filtering viruses when compared to any other car in the market. This claim may be correct but the HEPA filter in the car may still not filter some viruses that are extremely small and which could be used in biological weapons.
When the bioweapon defense mode is activated then, the car also generates positive pressure in the car's cabin and stops inflow of outside air in the car. However, the inside of the car still needs that extra air for creating positive pressurization.
"So that's not insignificant, but it doesn't in itself solve the problem, because you still have to have some way to filter that air," says Michael J. Buchmeier, who is the deputy director of the Pacific Southwest Regional Center for Biodefense and Emerging Diseases at the University of California, Irvine.
Larsen also noted that another problem with a biological attack is to find if there has been one nearby. The first symptoms of a biological attack may show in people days or weeks after an attack. By the time an owner of the Model X realizes a bio attack has ocurred and activates the bioweapon defense mode in the car, it may be too late.
