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Tesla's eagerly anticipated robotaxi service is on the verge of launching in Austin, promising a new era of autonomous transportation. However, the initiative has become mired in controversy following a fatal crash in Phoenix in 2023 involving a self-driving Tesla, raising urgent safety concerns.

For years, prominent figures in the tech world, including Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk, have touted the safety benefits of autonomous vehicles. Musk has long advocated for the potential of self-driving Teslas to reduce vehicular accidents and fatalities. Despite his ambitious assertions, Tesla’s fully autonomous capabilities remain unproven.

The Phoenix incident has intensified scrutiny on Tesla’s self-driving technology. In 2023, a Tesla operating in autonomous mode was involved in a pedestrian death – the first of its kind for the company. The tragic event unfolded as the vehicle, navigating a highway at sunset, failed to slow down after being signaled by a man and subsequently veered into a 71-year-old woman directing traffic. She had been assisting with the aftermath of a prior accident, and the incident occurred despite the presence of a driver in the Tesla who did not intervene.

Tesla took an alarming seven months to report the details of the incident to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), prompting a federal investigation into the company's "Full Self-Driving" software. Although marketed as fully autonomous, the technology requires continuous driver oversight and has been implicated in several crashes.

A significant point of contention is Tesla's reliance on visual cameras instead of the more robust LiDAR system used by competitors like Waymo. Critics argue that this choice has led to critical safety issues, evidenced by the rising number of accidents. By 2024, Tesla had recorded 467 crashes attributed to its autonomous systems, underscoring the gravity of these concerns.

In response to these challenges, Tesla is on a hiring spree for engineers focused on "sensor cleaning systems," aiming to address the shortcomings in their object detection technology. Despite these efforts, internal documents from Tesla suggest that the upcoming robotaxi service in Austin may encounter significant operational difficulties.

Bryant Walker Smith, a legal expert and transportation engineer, has expressed skepticism about Tesla's readiness for true automated driving. "They are claiming they will be imminently able to do something – true automated driving – that all evidence suggests they still can't do safely," Smith told Bloomberg. This sentiment echoes widespread apprehension as Tesla's robotaxi service prepares to hit Austin roads, where every driver and pedestrian potentially becomes a test subject in this unfolding experiment.