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Tesla Crash Kills 2

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is investigating
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 1, 2020 6:00 AM CST
Feds Investigating Fatal Tesla Crash
In this Saturday, Feb. 9, 2019, file photograph, a sign bearing the company logo stands outside a Tesla store in Cherry Creek Mall in Denver.   (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)

A Tesla crash killed two people in the wee hours of Sunday in a Los Angeles suburb, and now the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is investigating. The Tesla Model S was speeding, ran a red light, and hit a Honda Civic at the Gardena intersection, killing a man and woman in the Civic, the AP reports. A man and woman in the Tesla were hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries. No arrests have yet been made, but KTLA reports the investigation is ongoing. The NHTSA isn't saying whether the Tesla was in Autopilot mode, which is designed to automatically keep a safe distance between vehicles. Autopilot was engaged in at least three Tesla vehicles involved in fatal crashes in the US since 2016.

A dozen Tesla crashes in which Autopilot may be involved have been investigated by the NHTSA's special crash investigation team, the same team that will investigate this crash, Reuters reports. Results are pending in 10 of the cases, and in the two for which results have been published, one did involve Autopilot. Meanwhile, a woman was killed Sunday in Indiana when her husband, who was driving a Tesla, "failed to observe the emergency vehicle positioned in the passing lane of I-70, running into the back of the parked fire truck," per a police statement cited by 12 News. He told investigators he didn't remember whether Autopilot was activated at the time. (More Tesla stories.)

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