One of the giant false promises of Tesla is that it would improve safety by reducing distracted driver risk.

Investigators are now instead asking whether Tesla autopilot marketing is leading drivers to be more distracted than ever.

According to Sgt. Christopher Knox of the North Carolina State Highway Patrol, this was a case of distracted driving. WRAL News asked him if Yee’s Tesla was in autopilot mode, and if that could have played a role.

“We are looking at that,” he said. “That’s not definitive yet. We just believe the driver was distracted. Whether there was an autopilot feature in play or not, that’s something we hope to determine today and in the coming days.”

This tragedy is likely to be more confirmation that expert warnings have been accurate and Tesla has failed to heed them.

MIT researchers released a [2020] study that found that Tesla drivers are more distracted when they use the company’s semi-autonomous Autopilot…

The big fraud of Tesla seems to be getting a lot more attention lately.

A year ago, for instance, 17 percent of potential EV buyers told surveyors at YouGov that their first choice was a Tesla — more than any other brand. Now that number has dropped to 9 percent, outpaced by both Toyota and BMW. That sentiment seems to be turning up in actual sales, too.

Or as one very astute journalist puts it…

According to Consumer Reports, Teslas on Autopilot moved ‘like a drunken or distracted driver.’ …a 2019 independent review by the Quality Control Systems Corporation [stated] that collisions involving airbag deployment in fact likely increased following integration of Autopilot.

A decline in Tesla sales will surely save lives.