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Elon Musk Slows Tesla Deliveries On 'Dangerous' Trucks (electrek.co)
An anonymous reader quotes Electrek:
Tesla is always very busy in Norway, its biggest market per capita, but it has recently been difficult for the automaker to deliver its vehicles as its shipments keep being taken off the road for using transporters with "dangerous" trucks that do not conform to the rules. The California-based automaker generally ships its vehicles to Norway through the port of Drammen, but it is experiencing capacity issues so they are instead going through Gothenburg port and having to use more trucks to move the cars to its stores and service centers.
According to several media reports in Norway, over half a dozen of those trucks have been stopped by the authorities for a variety of safety reasons during inspections and one of the trucks that wasn't stopped ended up in an accident. Two Model S vehicles were crushed on the trailer involved in the accident. Tesla says that it is having difficulties finding competent transporters that comply to Norway's road requirements. On top of the safety issues, Tesla is also using transporters operating Euro 3 class trucks, which are more polluting.
Elon Musk tweeted in response to the article that "I have just asked our team to slow down deliveries.
"It is clear that we are exceeding the local logistics capacity due to batch build and delivery. Customer happiness & safety matter more than a few extra cars this quarter."
According to several media reports in Norway, over half a dozen of those trucks have been stopped by the authorities for a variety of safety reasons during inspections and one of the trucks that wasn't stopped ended up in an accident. Two Model S vehicles were crushed on the trailer involved in the accident. Tesla says that it is having difficulties finding competent transporters that comply to Norway's road requirements. On top of the safety issues, Tesla is also using transporters operating Euro 3 class trucks, which are more polluting.
Elon Musk tweeted in response to the article that "I have just asked our team to slow down deliveries.
"It is clear that we are exceeding the local logistics capacity due to batch build and delivery. Customer happiness & safety matter more than a few extra cars this quarter."
Norwegian here. This is just how the transportation market seems to be overall these days, and a follow-on effect of the European open market. It has nothing to do with Tesla specifically. It is not their trucks, and it happens for all other kinds of transportation of goods and services. This really should not be a story that so strongly features Tesla.
The pattern is pretty much this, that we keep reading about trucks that were stopped or investigated following an accident, that seem to 95% of the time come from Eastern Europe (the Baltic countries, Poland, and Rumania are typically the points of origin), due to non-functional brakes, tires that are wore down, cargo that is not secured, or whatever. Plus zombie drivers who have skipped the mandatory sleep.
This is particularly prominent in Winter, when we get typical Norwegian weather and some idiot truck driver halts all traffic on a clogged main road due to losing traction on a main road and somehow ending up blocking every lane. And afterwards you read that "the truck had summer tires".
A problem that really needs fixing. These drivers and truck companies ought to start getting something more than a little slap on the wrist for these issues. Super heavy fines and some jail time ought to be a good motivation to follow European safety standards. I see zero reason to cut those crooks any slack.