NHTSA Complaint #11469058 — 2021 TESLA MODEL S

While driving with a fully charged battery, the car dash warned “pull over to safe location. Battery cannot support all functions”. We were unable to fully pull over in the time before the car experienced a critical loss of functionality, as the car shut off in less than 1 minute from flashing the warning. The car lost all functionality, including loss of its flashers, putting us at significant risk since we were unable to alert other motorists to our presence on the side of the road as it was getting dark. The car is currently with the dealer and thus far they have been unable to identify the root cause of the issue but have acknowledged the existence of the problem. They’ve claimed the 12v battery died and the car does not have any safety redundancy built in to be able to access power from the main driving battery to power critical features such as the hazard lights. The biggest risk of safety is loss of indicators/flashers while on the side of the road. This feature in vehicles is meant to alert other drivers to the presence of a disabled vehicle. Consumer was told no physical problem was found with the car and a “firmware” problem is suspected. After repeated questioning, the Tesla dealer finally acknowledged that other 2021 Model S cars have experienced similar abrupt shut downs and the California engineers are aware of the problem. They cannot tell me when a firmware update will be available, but in the interim want to return the car to the consumer having done nothing to prevent the problem from recurring.