NTSB kicks Tesla off Model X crash investigation for blabbing information
The National Transportation Safety Board stripped Tesla Inc. of its role in an investigation of a fatal crash involving one of its vehicles, saying the electric carmaker failed to abide by an agreement not to disclose information while the probe was under way.
“While we understand the demand for information that parties face during an NTSB investigation, uncoordinated releases of incomplete information do not further transportation safety or serve the public interest,” NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said in a statement.
He relayed the decision Wednesday night in a call to Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk, he said.
The unusual move followed public statements by the company blaming the driver of a Tesla Model X who died in a March crash — statements made in apparent violation of agency protocols. The NTSB guards the integrity of its investigations closely, demanding that participants adhere to rules about what information they can release and their expected cooperation. These participants, known as parties to investigations, must sign legal agreements laying out their responsibilities.
“It is unfortunate that Tesla, by its actions, did not abide by the party agreement,” Sumwalt said.
Tesla shares were down 1% to $297.80 at 2:12 p.m. in New York after falling by as much as 2.4% following Bloomberg’s report of the NTSB action.
Tesla, in a statement issued late Wednesday, suggested it chose to leave the probe.
“Tesla withdrew from the party agreement with the NTSB because it requires that we not release information about Autopilot to the public, a requirement which we believe fundamentally affects public safety negatively,” the company said in an emailed statement. “We believe in transparency, so an agreement that prevents public release of information for over a year is unacceptable.”
Tesla said that although it won’t be a formal party to the probe, it will continue to provide technical assistance to the NTSB.
‘Out of play’
Companies that no longer have formal status as a party to an NTSB investigation can lose access to information uncovered in the investigation and the ability to shape the official record of the incident, said Peter Goelz, a former managing director at the NTSB who is now senior vice president at O’Neill & Associates, a Washington lobbying and public relations firm.
“By removing yourself from the process, you’re really taking yourself out of play in a critical element of the investigation,” he said. “It will by no means stop the investigation, and it will by no means hinder the investigation.”
The dispute between the safety agency and automaker stems from statements the company made regarding Walter Huang, a 38-year-old who died last month in his Model X while using the semiautonomous driver-assistance system known as Autopilot.
In a March 30 blog post, Tesla said that Huang’s hands weren’t on the Model X’s steering wheel for six seconds before the fatal crash. An NTSB spokesman said the agency was “unhappy” with Tesla for disclosing details during the investigation.
Musk and Sumwalt spoke by phone over the weekend and had what an agency spokesman said at the time was a constructive conversation. Musk promised to follow NTSB rules barring Tesla from commenting on the investigation.
But this week, Tesla responded to a local television appearance by Huang’s family saying the “only” explanation for the crash was that he “was not paying attention to the road, despite the car providing multiple warnings to do so.”
The company’s statements violated agency protocol for parties to an accident investigation by alleging the cause of the crash, Goelz said.
“The NTSB is a trusted investigatory agency. Their processes can be challenging and frustrating, but they are ultimately fair,” Goelz said by phone. “Mr. Musk and his company, and frankly the future of autonomous vehicles, would have been better served had they followed the rules and continued to participate fully in the investigation.”
Prior ejections
The action to remove the company from the probe was limited to the most recent fatal accident. Tesla is still a formal participant in the NTSB’s investigation of a January crash involving a Tesla Model S that was using Autopilot when it rear-ended a fire truck parked on a freeway near Los Angeles.
The stakes for Tesla’s bid to defend Autopilot are significant. The NTSB’s investigation of the March 23 crash involving Huang contributed to a major sell-off in the company’s shares. Musk claimed almost 18 months ago that the system will eventually render Tesla vehicles capable of full self-driving, and much of the value of the $50-billion company is linked to views that it could be an autonomous-car pioneer.
The safety board has thrown airlines, aircraft manufacturers and unions off of investigations in cases in which they were either making unauthorized statements or not producing information the NTSB expected of them.
Small agency
Because it’s a relatively small agency, the NTSB relies heavily on these parties to assist its investigations. The safety board has subpoena power that it has used in rare instances to compel companies involved in investigations to provide information.
NTSB rules don’t prohibit participants in investigations from releasing general information about their products. The agency’s oft-repeated rule of thumb is that factual information that could have been released before an accident can be put out afterward as well.
What the NTSB prohibits is the release of information related to the accident itself.
In December 2010, the safety board removed American Airlines, now part of American Airlines Group Inc., from an investigation into a runway accident in Jackson Hole, Wyo. American had taken one of the plane’s two crash-proof recorders and downloaded its contents before turning the device over to the agency.
In 2014, it kicked United Parcel Service Inc. and its pilots union off a probe into a cargo-jet crash that killed two people in Alabama. The safety board said then that UPS and the union “took actions prejudicial to the investigation by issuing comments and analyzing findings before the NTSB had met to determine a cause.”
“If one party disseminates information about the accident, it may reflect that party’s bias,” Christopher Hart, who then was the NTSB acting chairman, said at the time. “This puts the other parties at a disadvantage and makes them less willing to engage in the process, which can undercut the entire investigation.”
