CNBC reported on Monday Tesla was replacing front fender
cameras in several hundred Model S, X, and 3 vehicles due to faulty circuit
boards inside but had not issued a recall.
NHTSA said it is "monitoring all data sources"
including consumer complaints, and also urged "the public to let NHTSA
know if they think their vehicle may have a safety defect that isn't part of a
current recall."
US law "prohibits manufacturers from selling vehicles
with design defects posing unreasonable risks to safety," the agency said,
adding it has "robust enforcement tools to protect the public, to
investigate potential safety issues, and act when we find evidence of
noncompliance or an unreasonable risk to safety."
Consumer groups said the regulator needs to look into
whether Tesla should have recalled the defective parts.
“Reports of a service campaign repair to malfunctioning
front-end cameras that are critical to Tesla's driver assistance suite is
important enough to the safety of the vehicle to merit exploration by
NHTSA," said Jason K. Levine, executive director at Center for Auto
Safety.
"The reality is that the auto industry has a long
history of choosing to conduct service campaigns instead of recalls, but it is
too early to say whether that's the case here.”
A malfunction of front fender cameras, safety systems used
for blind spot monitoring, would likely create a safety risk, said David
Friedman, a former acting administration at NHTSA and now Vice President at
Consumer Reports.
"If people are losing reliable access to blind spot
images, or the effectiveness of autopilot or automatic emergency braking is
being hampered, the malfunction would seem to pose an unreasonable risk,"
he said.
Tesla was not immediately available for comment. © Reuters
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