Tesla cars and the battery within them came under heavy scrutiny last winter as temperatures dropped to record lows all across the country. Now, a man in Texas is claiming to have been locked out of his trendy new electric vehicle after the battery died due to high heat in Texas. Even more alarming is that Texas is now home to the headquarters of Tesla, so such high heat should not be a surprise to the engineers.
Dennis Hegstad is the name of the unlucky Tesla owner that was forced to wait outside of his vehicle until the temperature cooled. Dennis was completely stranded after his Tesla Model 3 refused to allow any access to the inside of the vehicle. He was later forced to call a tow truck even though the battery had over 100 miles of charge remaining.
Dennis took to Twitter to voice his displeasure with the automobile’s complete lack of reliability in what could have become a very dangerous situation. “what do you do when it’s so hot your @Tesla won’t respond to the mobile app or physical key? I can’t open the car or move the car to reach a charging point. I had 130 mile range this morning 7 hours ago Confusing situation when you need to leave to be somewhere.”
what do you do when it’s so hot your @tesla won’t respond to the mobile app or physical key? I can’t open the car or move the car to reach a charging point.
I had 130 mile range this morning 7 hours ago
Confusing situation when you need to leave to be somewhere @elonmusk pic.twitter.com/VrmDNuj9ml
— dennis hegstad (@dennishegstad) June 21, 2023
Describing the issue further, Dennis wrote, “I can’t unlock the car as the car doesn’t respond to the app. Physical key doesn’t work. And vehicle is not within reach of charging port cable.” He concluded by saying that the car would be stuck in his driveway.
The initial Tweet and corresponding video received over half a million views at the time of writing this article. To make matters worse, Dennis revealed in the comments that he has another car that runs on gas in his garage. However, the unresponsive Tesla was blocking that car in. So, this Tesla that was too hot to run was also stopping his gas vehicle from moving. And people wonder why some EV-skeptics are so wary about others switching to the new technological fad.
Dennis also explained that he has “some buyer’s remorse” after purchasing the vehicle in 2018. According to Dennis, in some correspondence that he had with Business Insider, the car’s primary battery was still completely operational. So, in the end, he received the car back within 24 hours and only paid a little over $100 to replace the smaller battery that is responsible for things like the locks on the door.
Unfortunately, Dennis’ faith in the car has to be shot. As he said on Twitter, the car is great to drive, but the small technical bugs and break-downs are far too common. While the comfort and entertainment amenities of Teslas are top-notch, many still question whether the vehicles can be dependable enough to serve as a main vehicle for a person with only one car.
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