As part of an investigation into the fatal crash of a Tesla in Mountain View, Calif., last year, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) this week issued a Safety Recommendation Report calling on the California State Transportation Agency to plan out the repair of traffic safety hardware.
Though the NTSB was quick to note that they have not yet identified the probable cause of the crash, the hardware troubles were found during their investigation. These issues, within the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans), negatively affect the timely repair of traffic safety hardware. As a result, NTSB also asks that efforts repaired include performance measures to track state compliance with repair timelines.
“Rather than wait to complete all facets of this crash investigation, we have moved ahead with issuing this safety recommendation report in the interest of motorists’ safety,” Robert Molloy, Director of the NTSB’s Office of Highway Safety, said. “Our review of Caltrans maintenance records identified examples of delayed repair of the crash attenuator at this location, including one damaged in January 2017 that was not repaired until April 2017.”
Such repair delays have been an issue since at least 2016 when they reared their head in yet another NTSB investigation.
In this case, a driver of the 2017 Tesla Model X P100D died when he crashed into a non-operational SCI SmartCushion 100GM crash attenuator on U.S. Highway 101 — a device meant to protect motorists by reducing collision forces. That attenuator had been inoperable for the 11 days before the crash when another incident damaged it. In this case, following the crash, the Tesla struck it while using the vehicle’s lane-keeping assist system. The Tesla driver subsequently struck two other vehicles in the accident.
The NTSB hopes to complete its full investigation within the first or second quarter of 2020.