{"id":474382,"date":"2026-10-23T10:14:16","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T10:14:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/474382\/"},"modified":"2026-10-23T10:14:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T10:14:16","slug":"the-tesla-cybercab-had-an-accident-in-austin-likely-because-it-has-no-lidar-sensors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/474382\/","title":{"rendered":"The Tesla Cybercab Had An Accident in Austin, Likely Because It Has No Lidar Sensors"},"content":{"rendered":"

KeysQuestions4Vehicle1<\/p>\n

Tesla’s Cybercab just reported its first crash to federal regulators, and the cause points directly to the company’s most controversial engineering bet: ditching lidar entirely in favor of cameras that Elon Musk himself has admitted can’t detect grey cats against dark pavement at night.<\/p>\n

When you normalize the crash data coming out of Texas, the Cybercab is statistically far more dangerous than Waymo’s fleet \u2014 same number of accidents, but with half the vehicles and half the miles driven.<\/p>\n

If you’re in Austin or anywhere these vehicles are being deployed, this isn’t an abstract technology debate anymore \u2014 it’s a public safety question being answered in real time on your streets, without your consent.<\/p>\n

Ask The Box \u2192<\/p>\n

Considering the Model Y?<\/p>\n

Model Y vs rival?Best trimReal MPG<\/p>\n

AI-generated summary from reviews, comparisons and articles by AutoNotion<\/p>\n

Breaking news: A Level 2+ assistance-equipped vehicle with no human supervision has crashed. Who woulda thought?<\/p>\n

Apparently not Tesla or its followers, who believe that the Cybercab is a completely safe idea. For the rest of us, it\u2019s too bad that this crash won\u2019t be a wake-up call for these followers. I mean, these are the same people who email me to say the Tesla Roadster with rockets<\/a> will be on the road in a few years.<\/p>\n

And honestly, I truly wish I was just a hater. That\u2019d be a better fate than being on the same road as unsupervised Level 2+ vehicles.<\/p>\n

Tesla reports Cybercab crash<\/p>\n

Tesla has reported the first-ever Cybercab crash to federal safety regulators just days after a fleet of the pedal-less vehicles descended upon Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) report states that the Cybercab drove over a large pothole filled with water. Even though it was just 5 miles per hour, the Cybercab was damaged.<\/p>\n

Luckily, nobody was involved with this incident. Unluckily, this accident occurred because Tesla\u2019s Cybercabs rely solely on video, with CEO Elon Musk condemning lidar scanners despite their ability<\/a> to detect these kinds of obstacles. Musk himself has admitted that Cybercabs can\u2019t see grey cats<\/a> against the road at night, basically admitting that the camera-based system is inadequate<\/a> for certain driving conditions.<\/p>\n

Despite this, the Cybercab is on the road. It\u2019s truly baffling.<\/p>\n

Robotaxi crash stats in Texas<\/p>\n

The Cybercab is not the only robotaxi to have an accident in Texas. Of course. In a four-week timespan ending in September 2026, there were 24 robotaxi crashes throughout Texas.<\/p>\n

Autonoci\u00f3n Newsletter<\/p>\n

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Eight of those crashes were Tesla robotaxis. Another eight involved Waymo. A simpleton could use this data to claim that both are equally safe or unsafe (whichever they think it proves regarding human drivers). But it\u2019s not really a fair comparison for Waymo.<\/p>\n

There are currently 319 registered Cybercab in the state of Texas. Waymo has 1,185 vehicles in Texas. The Cybercab (along with the Model Y taxis) has accumulated 3.1 million unsupervised miles. Waymo had driven 6.3 million miles in Austin as of December 2025, so that number has significantly increased since then.<\/p>\n

Basically, the Cybercab and Waymo reported the same number of accidents despite Waymo having more vehicles and more miles. In other words, the Cybercab is seeming way more likely to crash. Waymo also claims that some of those accidents were due to human-driven vehicles making mistakes.<\/p>\n

There are a few other cybercabs that have been involved in recent accidents in Texas. Avride had two crashes in Dallas and Zoox had one. This has brought their total number of accidents to 27 and 4, respectively. PlusAI was also mentioned in the report, which means there was one autonomous tractor-trailer crash.<\/p>\n

CEO David Liu has acknowledged that people are scared of the idea of an 18-wheeler without a human driver. Even though it\u2019s just one accident, this could lead to a larger catastrophe than a Waymo.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople are still scared of the 18-wheeler trucks. It\u2019s not the same thing (as robotaxis) because we\u2019re talking about 80,000-pound trucks, right? It will take time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

I say, as long as it\u2019s truly autonomous, I\u2019m okay with it. From my experience in a Waymo, I can see many benefits of autonomous vehicles. But a vehicle with a Level 2 driver assistance system should not be roaming the streets without a human supervisor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KeysQuestions4Vehicle1 Tesla’s Cybercab just reported its first crash to federal regulators, and the cause points directly to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":474383,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-474382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=474382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474382\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/474383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=474382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=474382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=474382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}