Tesla Is Sued by Family Who Says Faulty Doors Led to Daughter’s Death
The parents of a college student killed in a car crash last year in California sued Tesla on Thursday, claiming that the design of the doors in the company’s Cybertruck pickup made it nearly impossible for their daughter to escape the burning vehicle.
The suit, filed in a California court by the family of Krysta Tsukahara, 19, underlines longstanding questions about how the doors in many Teslas work, which is the focus of an investigation begun in September by federal auto safety regulators. The lawsuit is another setback for the Cybertruck, which has sold poorly and been recalled eight times since last year.
Tesla pioneered car doors that open or shut with the push of a button. Several other automakers have imitated that design, usually on electric models. Electronic doors give cars a high-tech aura and may modestly reduce wind resistance because their exterior handles typically do not protrude from the door.
The automaker’s door latches rely on a 12-volt battery that is separate from the high-voltage battery that drives the vehicle’s electric motor. If the power is cut off by a crash, the electronic door mechanism may not work.
The suit claims that Ms. Tsukahara’s injuries from the crash were minor but that she died of burns and smoke inhalation after the Cybertruck’s battery caught fire. She was unable to escape because the manual door releases were too difficult to find, the suit says.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/busin...ornia.html
The parents of a college student killed in a car crash last year in California sued Tesla on Thursday, claiming that the design of the doors in the company’s Cybertruck pickup made it nearly impossible for their daughter to escape the burning vehicle.
The suit, filed in a California court by the family of Krysta Tsukahara, 19, underlines longstanding questions about how the doors in many Teslas work, which is the focus of an investigation begun in September by federal auto safety regulators. The lawsuit is another setback for the Cybertruck, which has sold poorly and been recalled eight times since last year.
Tesla pioneered car doors that open or shut with the push of a button. Several other automakers have imitated that design, usually on electric models. Electronic doors give cars a high-tech aura and may modestly reduce wind resistance because their exterior handles typically do not protrude from the door.
The automaker’s door latches rely on a 12-volt battery that is separate from the high-voltage battery that drives the vehicle’s electric motor. If the power is cut off by a crash, the electronic door mechanism may not work.
The suit claims that Ms. Tsukahara’s injuries from the crash were minor but that she died of burns and smoke inhalation after the Cybertruck’s battery caught fire. She was unable to escape because the manual door releases were too difficult to find, the suit says.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/02/busin...ornia.html
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
