News
Tesla misses insurance firm’s ‘Safest Cars’ list because its EVs don’t crash often enough
Teslas are among the safest cars on the road, and part of this is due to their suite of active and passive safety features. From Autopilot’s capabilities to standard features like Automatic Emergency Braking, Tesla’s electric cars are designed to avoid accidents, or protect its occupants in the event that a crash is unavoidable.
Yet, despite the company’s reputation for making extremely safe vehicles, Tesla was strangely missing from a Swedish insurance firm’s recently-released list of safest cars for 2019. The reason behind this is both parts impressive and ironic at the same time.
Every year, Swedish insurance company Folksam releases the results of its annual study on the country’s safest cars, a list that was dominated this year by the Toyota Rav4. To determine which vehicles make the cut, Folksam stated that it must be able to analyze actual crash data from an ample number of collisions.
This proved problematic for Tesla’s electric cars, as the company’s vehicles simply did not crash often enough for Folksam to get enough data. This year, for example, the insurance company only recorded seven accidents from Tesla’s vehicles, which is simply too few. Anders Kullgren, Folksam’s head of research, explained to news agency NyTeknik that Tesla’s absence in the company’s safest vehicles list is due to statistics.
“We saw seven accidents with Tesla in this year’s material and that is far too little. They have very many safety systems and high security, which means that they may never be included in our lists if the cars’ (number of accidents) is too small,” he said (translated from Swedish to English using Google Translate).
Elaborating further, the Folksam head of research explained that its safest cars list is published primarily for car buyers looking to purchase used vehicles. When asked by an electric car enthusiast on Twitter why vehicles in its safest cars list require an ample number of real accidents to qualify for the firm’s rankings, Folksam responded that it actually acknowledges Tesla, which it lists as one of its recommended new cars.
Teslas are among the safest vehicles on the road today. The electric car maker’s Q2 2019 vehicle safety report showed one accident for every 3.27 million miles driven with Autopilot engaged. Vehicles without Autopilot but have Tesla’s active safety features engaged recorded one accident for every 2.19 million miles driven, and cars operating without Autopilot and active safety features enabled recorded one accident every 1.41 million miles. In comparison, the NHTSA recorded one accident for every 498,000 miles driven.
The Model 3, Tesla’s more affordable vehicle yet, has also set records with its safety features. After garnering a perfect 5-star safety rating from the NHTSA, the electric sedan also granted a perfect score by the Euro NCAP in all four of its tests’ categories. Matthew Avery, head of research at Thatcham Research, which conducts the crash tests with the Euro NCAP, stated that Tesla’s emphasis on safety was evident in the Model 3’s design and features.
“Tesla has done a great job of playing the structural benefits of an electric vehicle to its advantage. The Tesla Model 3 achieved one of the highest Safety Assist scores we have seen to date,” he said.
H/T @Dagispappan.
News
Tesla Full Self-Driving displays impressive collision avoidance with semi
A Tesla on Full Self-Driving helped a driver avoid a collision with a semi by anticipating the truck’s movement.
Tesla Full Self-Driving has displayed incredible anticipatory measures in the past to avoid collisions from both oncoming cars and vehicles approaching from behind.
In a recent demonstration, the semi-autonomous driving functionality averted disaster as it confused the driver by taking a precautionary measure as an oncoming semi-truck started to drift into its lane. By the end of the occurrence, the driver knew why FSD did what it had done.
Tesla’s FSD Supervised prevented this family from hitting a deer
Full Self-Driving avoids disaster
In a video from X account @AIDRIVR, Full Self-Driving navigated as normal when it started to take an oncoming sharp left-hand curve a tad higher than usual.
Normally, the vehicle would stay in the lane, but this time, it started to drift toward the shoulder after what appeared to be a small reduction in speed.
AIDRIVR said he “wondered why FSD was taking this corner so wide,” but the answer quickly approached him from the other side of the road, proving once again that Tesla’s suite is a few steps ahead of even human drivers at times:
wondered why FSD was taking this corner so wide when suddenly… pic.twitter.com/zoIP5tXCm9
— ΛI DRIVR (@AIDRIVR) May 13, 2025
A semi-truck in the oncoming lane started to drift over the center line through this sharp turn.
With these large vehicles, these curves can sometimes prove to be better handled by taking the turn a tad wider, which means the large commercial vehicle will start to approach the middle yellow lines.
However, this is much to the chagrin of other drivers and can be a major inconvenience and safety hazard.
Full Self-Driving continues to show instances where it is predicting and anticipating the behaviors and actions of other drivers, keeping occupants in the Tesla safe by using certain tactics to avoid collisions.
Elon Musk
Tesla CEO Elon Musk confirms Robotaxi will come to Saudi Arabia
Tesla Robotaxi will be in Saudi Arabia one day, Elon Musk confirms.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk confirmed during the Saudi-U.S. Investment Forum on Tuesday that the company’s Robotaxi platform would eventually land in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, essentially confirming the intention to grow a driverless fleet of vehicles outside of the United States.
This is the first time Musk has specifically confirmed Tesla’s intention to expand into Saudi Arabia, although based on the company’s plans, a global expansion is more expected than a confined Robotaxi platform that is limited to only the West.
Musk confirmed during the Investment Forum, where the U.S. agreed with the Saudis to a $600 billion investment pledge, that Robotaxi would eventually expand to the country. The CEO did not mention a specific timeframe, but Tesla is set to launch the Robotaxi platform in Austin, Texas, in June.
“Really, you can think of cars, or future cars, as being robots on four wheels. I think it will be very exciting to have autonomous vehicles here in the Kingdom, if you’re amenable.”
🚨 Tesla Robotaxi will be available in Saudi Arabia, Elon Musk confirms:
“You heard it here from Elon! He’s bringing Robotaxi to the Kingdom.” pic.twitter.com/3IeaZezYb8
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) May 13, 2025
As Tesla’s Full Self-Driving suite is still supervised, it is expanding to other parts of the globe. Earlier this year, it made its way to China for the first time ever, with many giving rave reviews of the driver assistance platform.
Tesla plans to expand to Europe later this year, but the company is still awaiting regulatory approval from EU agencies, something that will likely take some time to complete.
The big takeaway is that the Robotaxi platform is not confined to a single model, like the Cybercab. Instead, Robotaxi could be any Tesla vehicle, as long as it is capable of unsupervised Full Self-Driving. This is something that will require Tesla to work with local authorities to first launch a Supervised version of the suite, which could then expand to the unsupervised FSD platform, enabling a Robotaxi network in the country.
Nevertheless, Tesla’s relationship with the Middle East seems to be good. The company recently launched the Cybertruck in Saudi Arabia, enabling customer orders just last month.
Tesla confirms Cybertruck will make its way out of North America this year
Additionally, Musk’s Starlink was recently given approval for both maritime and aviation use cases, expanding the relationship between the country and the CEO. This was also confirmed during the Investment Forum today.
News
Tesla is building Cortex 2.0 supercomputer facility in Giga Texas
The site was listed as the Central Campus Support facility, but recently, the filings have been updated as Cortex 2.0.
Tesla may already have a supercomputer cluster in the Giga Texas complex, but it seems like the electric vehicle maker is not done with its supercomputer plans just yet. Based on images taken of the Giga Texas complex recently, it appears that work is now underway to construct a new facility for Cortex 2.0, a companion to the site’s existing Cortex supercluster.
New Giga Texas Facilities
As per longtime Tesla Gigafactory Texas watcher Joe Tegtmeyer, Tesla has been constructing a facility on the North side of the complex for a few months now. Initially, the site was listed as the Central Campus Support facility, but recently, the filings have been updated as Cortex 2.0. So far, work is underway for the Cortex 2.0 building shell, though permits have already been filed for other parts of the upcoming facility.
The speed of the buildout for the Cortex 2.0 facility is rapid, with the drone operator estimating that the location may be operational as early as late this year. It would also not be surprising if Tesla ends up ramping its activities at Gigafactory Texas’ Cortex 2.0 supercomputer cluster sometime next year.
FSD Training and Beyond
Tesla’s heavy investments in its supercomputer clusters are expected to help the company develop and refine its self-driving system, which is currently deployed in non-autonomous form as Full Self-Driving (FSD) Supervised. Tesla is expected to launch a robotaxi service in Austin in a few weeks, though these vehicles are expected to use FSD Unsupervised, which would be fully autonomous.
Apart from FSD, Tesla’s Optimus program will likely require a substantial amount of computing power as well. Elon Musk has stated that Tesla should be able to build its first “legion” of Optimus robots this year, with production ramping next year. Considering these ambitious timelines, perhaps Giga Texas’ Cortex 2.0 facility would be fully busy as soon as it becomes operational.
Check out a recent drone flyover of the Giga Texas complex in the video below.
Tesla Full Self-Driving displays impressive collision avoidance with semi
Tesla CEO Elon Musk confirms Robotaxi will come to Saudi Arabia
Tesla is building Cortex 2.0 supercomputer facility in Giga Texas
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