NHTSA Complaint #11611069 — 2023 TESLA MODEL Y

I was driving highway speed several miles from home on the highway. Suddenly and spontaneously the hood came up on the car and smashed through the windshield. There were no other cars in that lane, which allowed me to pull over on the right shoulder. However, if there was any other cars and I hadn’t been in the right lane, it would’ve caused a major accident as there was no way for the driver to see and the car is not aerodynamic enough to move at high speeds at that point. After the car was pulled over, and I was able to get out without glass getting everywhere. It was no noticed that the car still thought the front hood was engaged and was allowing me to hit the open button as it was closed. The car also never recorded the event, even though the windshield was smashed with the dash cam that is built into the car that is meant to auto detect incidents. The car never even gave a warning that the hood had any issues. I checked out the front hood and noticed the latch that is supposed to be attached to the hood was still attached to the lock, but not attached to the hood. There was no thread in the holes on the hood meaning that the bolts must’ve had to unscrew as opposed to snap. I only saw one bolt left in the car and even that bolt came out later. Once the car was towed to the Tesla dealership, the Tesla dealership would not help us and did not say that they could fix it. We took a video of hitting the unlock button for the hood, and which the lock can be seen being given up by the locking mechanism and thrown onto the floor. Only at this point did the car even have any safety warning that the hood might be open. The car forces you to acknowledge that the hood is even open at all in order to drive. I tried it on another Tesla and only latched it down partially and even then it still says it’s open. I do believe that my car had a faulty part and a faulty system for safety as no notification was ever offered to me.