San Francisco: A Smart Summon Tesla vehicle crashed into a $3.5 million private jet, as its owner activated the automatic parking or ‘Smart Summon’ mode from his smartphone.
A video, posted on discussion forum Reddit, showed the crash as the Tesla owner “summoned” the car, reports The Verge.
The Reddit user said the incident took place “at an event sponsored by aircraft manufacturer Cirrus at Felts Field in Spokane, Washington”.
The Tesla owner was apparently using the ‘Smart Summon’ feature that enables a Tesla vehicle to leave a parking space and navigate around obstacles to its owner.
With the Tesla app, you can “summon” your car from your smartphone to you from a maximum distance of 200 feet.
The Reddit user said they were not the “poor soul (with poor decision making abilities) who summoned his Tesla around several expensive aircraft – only to crash it into the most expensive one ($3,500,000)!”
According to the electric car-maker, ‘Smart Summon’ is designed to allow you to move Model Y to your location (using your phone’s GPS as a target destination) or to a location of your choice, maneuvering around and stopping for objects as necessary.
‘Smart Summon’ works with the Tesla mobile app when your phone is located within approximately 6 metres of Model Y.
“This is useful for moving Model Y out of a tight parking spot, through puddles, or helping you retrieve your car while carrying packages. You must maintain a clear line of sight between you and Model Y and closely monitor the vehicle and its surroundings at all times,” according to Tesla.
The ‘Smart Summon’ feature was first rolled out in 2019, and Tesla owners started posting videos of near-crashes or confused, slow-moving vehicles.
Read More:
US carmaker Ford ropes in former Tesla engineer to lead ‘Advanced EV Dev’
Tesla named ‘most trusted’ brand developing fully-autonomous vehicles
