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Tesla opens Erie Supercharger connecting west PA with NY
After years of not-so-quiet desperation, the “missing link” Supercharger in Erie, PA has finally powered up! The location is a vital link for Tesla owners going multiple directions and one that has been near the top of regional owners’ requests.
While you might not think of Erie as a transportation hub, it quickly became a desirable charging stop as the Supercharger network has been built out, much like railroad stations and crossroads have historically become vital only after their peripheral arteries grew.
Emails to and from Tesla suggesting locations had always centered around the busy Peach Street commercial district. Indications were strong that Tesla had found a site long ago only to have it fall through for unknown reasons– a story that would seem to mirror the same timetable and complications that long plagued the Harrisburg, PA Supercharger.
The one-two punch of having two strategically located Pennsylvania charging sites fall through must have hit the team hard after the relative ease of building Somerset and Cranberry locations near Pittsburgh. Harrisburg was another long-bemoaned missing link that made travel across the state problematic at best. Eventually, a welcoming property was found and construction in Harrisburg and Erie have been nearly simultaneous, with Harrisburg coming online just a few weeks earlier.
With Erie now powered up, the hosting businesses in Erie are hoping to attract some new guests. My own observations from frequent travels up and down I-79/90 would suggest they’re going to be pleasantly surprised. Ontario license plates make semi-annual appearances in large numbers as the “Snowbirds” transit western Pennsylvania. They’re also common sights around Pittsburgh year-round, with a good majority of them coming from Toronto.
The largest city in Ontario is its provincial capital, Toronto– indeed, it might surprise many to find out that Toronto has long been the largest city in Canada, more than double the size of Vancouver. It also barely nudges Chicago out of the top four on the continent, with only Mexico City, New York City and Los Angeles claiming more residents. So when the city of Toronto goes on vacation… a good many of them wind up in western Pennsylvania.
For Tesla owners in Ontario, the Erie Supercharger is a reasonable half-day’s drive away. Straight drive-time is about 4 hours, but add in border crossings, charging stops and some meals and those driving from Canada will find the proximity of the Erie hotels to be an ideal overnight rest– regardless of which way they’re going. It’s also an ideal overnight from Washington, DC (among others) and a more ambitious day away from Chicago or Boston. The “jump” from Pittsburgh/Cleveland to Buffalo is history!
More importantly, the addition of Erie makes these trips less butt-clenching. Hyper-miling the stretch from Ohio or Pittsburgh to Buffalo, New York, was always doable in warm weather with careful planning and discipline. Winter brings brutally cold weather from across Lake Erie and strong headwinds (particularly for south/west bound traffic), often laden with snow and ice. With that comes a dramatically shortened range and the trip becomes very questionable in even an 85/90 kWh Tesla. Several drivers have found themselves limping through bad weather conditions with cabin heat exchanged for heart-pounding images of impending doom. Erie makes these worries all go away and four-season travel around the lake should be no less difficult than in a gas-powered car… and certainly much more pleasurable!
If you have destination charging as an option, the Erie Supercharger also partially plugs a large hole in rural New York and Pennsylvania. With a modest 200 mile (as the crow flies) radius centered on the charger you could hypothetically now reach deep into the less populous parts of both states to enjoy their many parks. Or… admittedly, you could drive into the middle of Lake Erie and have range enough to make it back (assuming you’ve first activated submarine mode).
The Hilton Garden Inn, which hosts the Supercharger, is part of a larger facility called the Ambassador Banquet and Conference Center, which includes a Courtyard by Marriott and the Safari Grille. The entire facility is ideal for any road-weary snow birds making their seasonal migration or wedding parties/business meetings full of Tesla owners.
Within easy walking distance of the Supercharger there a lots of food options. A Cracker Barrel beckons for those needing a longer charge, while an Applebee’s and Burger King split the medium and short charging crowd. If you’re willing to brave the pedestrian lights on Peach Street, you can also easily walk to our usual stops, Quaker Steak and Lube. Widen your search zone a little more and the world is your oyster: Steak n’ Shake, Golden Corral, Krispy Kreme, Texas Roadhouse, Eat n’ Park– they’re all accessible by sidewalk. Or you can drive to many more within a mile radius, like our other frequent stop: Famous Dave’s Bar-B-Que.
Other nearby shopping opportunities and amusements are nearly endless. All the big box store companies are represented as well as a movie theater and a family-oriented water park called Splash Lagoon, which is owned by the same parent company as the Hilton Garden Inn.
One of the initial unknowns was how Tesla would lay out the chargers themselves. I’d speculated that given the proximity to campgrounds and the lake that Tesla might make the slots pull-through to allow Model X’s with trailers an easier charge.
Turns out that was wrong, but there is an advantage to the way Tesla has situated these chargers versus most other locations. They ran a curbed peninsula out into the parking lot between two rows of pre-existing parking spots, which effectively gives access to the chargers from both sides. I’m not a math expert, but to me that at least halves the chances of any given charger being blocked by a gas car.
By powering up the Erie Supercharger, Tesla has essentially completed two major routes that touch all four compass points. With the elimination of cold weather as a range concern, Tesla tourists can now whoosh around the northeast with relative ease… with two regional holes yet to fill (and hopefully next): I-80 in Pennsylvania and I-86 in upstate New York.
Maps courtesy of Supercharge.info
Please note: We are not specifically authorized, sponsored by, or otherwise directly associated with Tesla Motors and make no claims to be so.
News
SpaceX’s Gwynne Shotwell just made a quiet gesture toward Tesla
SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell quietly followed Tesla on X, and merger watchers noticed right away.
SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell has started following Tesla’s official account on X, a small change that landed in the middle of a very loud merger conversation. Whole Mars Catalog joked about it on Sunday.
A follow is not an announcement, and neither company has said anything about a deal. What gives the moment weight is the timing. Barclays analyst Dan Levy has told clients that an agreement could come before Tesla’s annual meeting, which must be held by December 6, with SpaceX as the buyer in an all stock deal, as we reported after the Roadster unveiling. Wedbush’s Dan Ives has stuck with a 2027 timeline.
“Shit, I better start following their X account if i’m gonna be helping run the company”
— Whole Mars Catalog (@wholemars) October 18, 2026
Shotwell is the executive most worth watching if the two companies do move closer. When Musk was asked at the All In Summit why Tesla and SpaceX remain separate, Shotwell sat next to him and said SpaceX personnel had already moved into xAI to fill leadership and engineering gaps. The businesses were integrating “faster than I thought,” she said, though “not fully integrated yet.” Her responsibilities have also grown since SpaceX absorbed xAI, and she now oversees operations that include Grok and the company’s AI compute buildout.
The financial links are already there. Tesla’s $2 billion xAI investment turned into a stake of less than one percent in SpaceX, the two share the Terafab chip project in Austin, and Musk exercised his 2018 Tesla options a week after SpaceX began trading, a sequence analysts flagged as giving SpaceX public shares to use in a deal. Musk holds about 20 percent of Tesla and controls 85.1 percent of SpaceX’s voting power, according to our earlier breakdown.
The next test is close at hand. SpaceX reports its second earnings as a public company on Tuesday after the close, and Tesla follows on Wednesday. Musk told analysts in July that “we can’t talk about combining companies and that kind of thing on an earnings call,” so a direct answer is unlikely from either stage. Tesla shareholders can still submit and vote on questions through the Say portal until 4 p.m. EDT on Monday, and the merger is a recurring theme in the queue.
Elon Musk
Tesla Roadster owners to get “Flying Stunt Mode” and looping track access
Musk says Roadster owners can command the unveiling stunts autonomously, with a Texas looping track.
Elon Musk says owners of the new Tesla Roadster will be able to ask the car to perform the stunts Tesla showed at its unveiling, with the car doing the driving itself. Musk made the comment Saturday in a reply on X to tech blogger Robert Scoble, and he added a promise of a looping track at Tesla’s Texas headquarters.
Scoble had argued that the person in the Roadster is not really driving it. In his description, the driver operates a computer that tells another computer what to do, with steering, braking and acceleration all handled by wire. Musk answered, “True. You will be able to ask the Roadster to perform any of the tricks shown autonomously, as it will be sentient. Also, we will have a wild looping track (crazier even than Hot Wheels) at our Texas HQ where you can test out your Roadster.”
@Scobleizer True.
You will be able to ask the Roadster to perform any of the tricks shown autonomously, as it will be sentient.
Also, we will have a wild looping track (crazier even than Hot Wheels) at our Texas HQ where you can test out your Roadster.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 17, 2026
At the October 15 event outside Waco, the car drove up a curved ramp until it was upside down, flew off on cold gas thrusters, flipped and landed. It also hovered over a Cybercab, Cybertruck, Semi, Model Y and Model 3 while moving. As we noted in our breakdown of the three Roadster configurations, Musk said at the event that the car “literally is just going to puff itself up” to perform the maneuvers whenever an owner wants. Saturday’s reply adds that the car would run them on its own.
Tesla has described some of the hardware that would make that possible. The Roadster uses steer by wire with a yoke, and its cold gas thrusters rely on electric actuators for small adjustments in flight. A fan system under the car creates suction, which Tesla says is strong enough to hold it upside down, a setup we covered in our look at the Roadster’s fan system and thrusters.
Musk did not say when an autonomous stunt feature might arrive, how it would work, or what he means by sentient. He also gave no size, location or opening date for the Texas track. Production is planned for Giga Texas in 2027 or 2028, and Tesla says the car is not approved for public road use. The Rocket version, the one built to fly, is invite only.
The comment follows a week of Musk teasing the event, including his claim that the demo would be a banger, which we covered before the stream. Tesla reports third quarter earnings on October 21, and shareholders can submit and vote on questions through the Say portal until 4 p.m. EDT on October 20, according to our earnings Q&A preview. A question about autonomous Roadster stunts and the Texas track would be a quick way to get specifics from management.
Elon Musk
How to use Grok Bot to block spam calls and texts
Musk told users to ask Grok Bot to scrub their phone numbers from spam lists.
Elon Musk has a new use case for Grok Bot, and it is the spam call. On Thursday he replied to an X user named Arash with a short instruction: “Ask your @Grok @Bot to remove your phone number from spam call & text lists!” Arash had said he got tired of the calls, had an AI bot find his number on listing sites and file removal requests, and packaged the process as a free skill for others.
The skill is called Spam-Call Scrubber, which is described to find a phone number on people search sites and data brokers, submits the opt outs, completes the confirmation emails those sites send back, and rechecks on a schedule the user picks. Using it requires the Grok Bot app. The pitch is time saved, since most broker opt outs sit behind separate forms on separate sites.
Ask your @Grok @Bot to remove your phone number from spam call & text lists!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 15, 2026
Musk said Grok Bot now gives each bot its own email address, and that it can detect scam emails. On Thursday he also said SpaceX would make users whole if the bot botches a purchase or leaks a card, then told users to shop away from Amazon after the retailer blocked the agent, as Teslarati reported. The terms of service we reviewed at the time put responsibility for what an agent does on the user.
For Tesla owners, Grok Bot is not just a phone app. Tesla brought Grok Bot into its vehicles on September 22, and we argued earlier this week that the Cybercab’s real advantage may be the errands it runs during a ride. Every Cybercab and the rest of the Model Y Robotaxi fleet has it enabled. The more routine tasks like this one become, the more a rider has reason to hand over something personal in the back seat.
The new Spam-Call Scrubber skill can be downloaded for free and works on sites that honor removal requests, while noting that listings can reappear, and illegal robocallers do not check any registry. Whether Spam-Call Scrubber cuts anyone’s call volume is something the first wave of users will find out, and Musk’s endorsement guarantees that wave is coming.
SpaceX’s Gwynne Shotwell just made a quiet gesture toward Tesla
Tesla Roadster owners to get “Flying Stunt Mode” and looping track access
How to use Grok Bot to block spam calls and texts
SpaceX reveals how its 1 Million AI satellite network will work and prevent space collisions
Tesla Roadster: Three configs, one can fly, 0-60 in 0.8 seconds
