US Transport Chief Defends Auto Safety Agency After Musk Criticism

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg gives a unrecorded interrogation to the quality media extracurricular of the White House successful Washington, connected Oct. 13, 2021. (Leah Millis/Reuters)

WASHINGTON—U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said connected Wednesday that Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk should straight rise with him immoderate issues astir the hiring of a elder information advisor who has been captious of the automaker.

“He’s invited to telephone maine if he’s concerned,” Buttigieg told reporters astatine an lawsuit connected Wednesday. “We are liable for making definite that each conveyance connected the roadworthy is safe.”

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) connected Tuesday confirmed a Reuters study that Duke University engineering and machine subject prof Missy Cummings is being named a caller elder advisor for information astatine NHTSA, saying successful a connection it looks guardant “to leveraging her acquisition and enactment successful information and autonomous technologies.”

On Tuesday, Musk wrote connected Twitter: “Objectively, her way grounds is highly biased against Tesla.”

She responded to Musk connected Twitter saying: “Happy to beryllium down and speech with you anytime.”

NHTSA successful August opened a ceremonial information probe into Tesla’s Autopilot strategy successful 765,000 U.S. vehicles aft a bid of crashes involving Tesla models and exigency vehicles.

Cummings has repeatedly expressed concerns astir Tesla’s Autopilot feature. In 2019, she wrote connected Twitter: “I person driven respective Teslas—autopilot easy causes mode confusion, is unreliable and unsafe @NHTSArecalls should necessitate @tesla to crook it off.”

NHTSA said Cummings was being named for a “temporary assignment” nether the Intergovernmental Personnel Act Mobility Program.

Last week, NHTSA asked Tesla wherefore it has not issued a callback to code bundle updates made to Autopilot strategy to amended the vehicles’ quality to observe exigency vehicles.

To date, NHTSA has identified 12 crashes that progressive Tesla vehicles utilizing the precocious driver-assistance systems and exigency vehicles. NHTSA said astir of the incidents took spot aft dark.

By David Shepardson