Electric cars have many benefits, but they can also have problems, and sometimes those problems can be very serious.
Renee Sanchez, a grandmother from Phoenix, was excited to take her 20-month-old granddaughter to the zoo. She put her granddaughter in the car seat, closed the door, and went to get into the driver’s seat.
But when she tried to open the front door, she had a big problem.
“My car was dead,” she told AZFamily. “I couldn’t get in. My phone key wouldn’t open it. My card key wouldn’t open it.”
Since Sanchez was stuck outside the car and her granddaughter was already strapped into her car seat, she had no choice but to call 911.
“And when they got here, the first thing they said was, ‘Uggh, it’s a Tesla. We can’t get in these cars,’” she said. “And I said, ‘I don’t care if you have to cut my car in half. Just get her out.'”
Sanchez said her granddaughter was “OK” at first, but when firefighters arrived and started using an axe to break the Tesla’s window, the little girl began to cry.
Once the 20-month-old was safely in her grandmother’s arms, Sanchez started to feel angry.
The 12-volt battery in her car had died without warning. Drivers are supposed to get three warnings before their batteries die, but Sanchez did not get any warnings. A Tesla service department confirmed that no warnings were sent to her car.
Now Sanchez wants first responders educated on how to handle dead electric vehicles.
“They were as much in the dark as I was.”
Despite the terrifying incident, Sanchez is still a fan of Tesla, though now she’s a bit more cautious.
“I give Tesla props. When it works, it’s great. But when it doesn’t, it can be deadly,” Sanchez said.
