SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean police are examining a Tesla Inc electric car after its driver told police it went out of control and crashed into a wall killing a passenger and injuring two other people.
The Model X smashed into the wall and caught fire in the parking lot of a Seoul apartment building late on Wednesday, police said. It took about an hour to put out the fire.
South Korea’s forensic agency would investigate the car to identify the cause of the accident, police said.
Tesla was not immediately available for comment.
In January, the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said it will review a petition asking the agency to formally investigate and recall 500,000 Tesla vehicles over sudden unintended acceleration reports.
The petition covers 2012 through 2019 model year Tesla Model S, 2016 through 2019 Tesla Model X, and 2018 through 2019 Tesla Model 3 vehicles, the agency said.
Tesla sold 11,601 cars in South Korea from January to November, sharply up from last year’s 2,430 sales, according to CarIsYou Data Research Institute.
The U.S. electric car maker is also under investigation by South Korea’s transport ministry over its autopilot functions, the ministry said earlier this year.
(Reporting by Heekyong Yang and Hyunjoo Jin; Editing by Stephen Coates)
