The Euro NCAP crash test scoring was just revised so that cars that don’t have manual controls for the most important functionality cannot get 5 star ratings anymore.
this post was submitted on 22 Dec 2025
530 points (99.4% liked)
News
33699 readers
3275 users here now
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.
Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.
7. No duplicate posts.
If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners.
The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
There is a manual override in Teslas too. It's just so well hidden that you're not going to find in an emergency.
Manual overrides won’t count.
It turns out people don’t have time to read manuals and find hidden options in emergencies.
load more comments
(8 replies)
One would think the crash tests would automatically produce results that would disqualify vehicles from a 5-star rating. Why would you need an amendment to the rules if crashes were disabling door locks and rendering doors inoperable? That seems like an automatic strike against safety.
Because the door handles are not always disabled in a crash. There's technically a system in place to extend the handles if a crash is detected, which works the majority of the time. The issue is that, clearly, this system is not reliable enough (because, ya know, if the control system gets wrecked in a crash, it cant extend the handles). But my guess is that it still works enough in crash tests to not automatically disqualify it from 5-stars.
load more comments
(2 replies)
“It’s terrifying,” said Kevin Clouse, a Georgia resident who was trapped in his Model 3 following a 2023 crash and had to kick out a window to escape. He recently filed a complaintwith US regulators and has sought to raise awareness of door-related entrapment on social media. “You’re in a box that’s on fire and you can’t get out.”
What a horrifying way to go.
load more comments
(19 replies)
When I was young and naïve in my 50s, I thought US cars had safety requirements, and the era of rolling death traps had been beaten back by Ralph Nader. Must've been my mistake. Is there nobody in the government looking at safety issues like un-openable doors?
Is there nobody in the government looking at safety issues like un-openable doors?
Really? Are you actually surprised? The man who decided to put electric un-openable doors onto is the same man who took a chainsaw to the federal regulatory budget and got rid of any agency that had the the authority to rule on such an issue.
To repeat:
Is there nobody in the government looking at safety issues like un-openable doors?
Nope, Elon Musk fired the people who were responsible for making his cars safe because Elon thought their recommendations cost too much and your safety is a sacrifice Elon Musk is willing to make if it makes Tesla stock value increase.
Shut it libtard, “safety” is a made-up democrat hoax. Don’t wear your seatbelt, die like a real man.
I feel it is probably necessary to add /s
My grandfather 40 years ago rolled his Bronco II into a ditch while drinking and driving. I honestly believe he’d lived if he wore his seat belt. The accident ejected him and broke his neck…ending his life.
Sorry to hear that friend.. safety is no joke.
Regulation is bad. Anything that restricts multimillion donor billionaires' wise ways of doing business is literally communism. Or was it Fascism.
For real. Mechanical handle hidden under the rubber cupholder is wild. As a European I'm amazed that it's legal.
I don't see how prospective car buyers can see shit like that and not see it as indicative of much larger design issues lurking under the hood.
Like, how do you see that and not immediately question the safety concerns of adding additional steps to escape the vehicle if there is an accident and the electric door loses power? How do you from there not question what other poor design decisions may have been made if something so obvious got through? Do people just not think about the things they're spending 10s of thousands of dollars on?
I think that most people just don't think about such details. Personally I wouldn't. I'd think about the ergonomics of the unlock mechanism when it works as intended, which sucks, by the way.
But I wouldn't really think about safety. It's not my job. I would assume the industrial designer did their job, and that the regulator did theirs.
A lot of prospective car buyers like the thing based on the few details they interact with during a test drive and don't think any further ahead, just like with everything else in their lives.
I hate that others have jumped on the door handle trends. It's like apple being "brave enough" to remove the headphone port. My car at least has the electric switch and mechanical backup on the same handle. I don't love it, but you can't get trapped inside.
load more comments
(3 replies)
Of course there are in around 95% of the rest of the world.
There is regulation. Tesla is just the first company to make a separate emergency handle. Other companies managed to figure out how to do it with one handle. Even with frameless doors.
load more comments
(3 replies)
Can someone explain what was wrong with normal door handles that they would do this?
Is it like some Steve Jobs-esque obsession with a car not being a car or something?
They think the extra .01 "mpg" gained from smooth doors is worth the risk. I think most people would agree that it's not.
It's not necessary to have electric door handles for that. Aircraft have been using purely mechanical handles where one side is pushed to make the other stand out enough to pull for decades. Several flush door handle designs requiring no electronics have appeared on cars as well.
Nah, then make them pop out on pressing, you don't need an electric actuator
load more comments
(1 replies)
As another commenter pointed out it does have a noticeable impact on mpg, however you can still do flush mounted handles that are fully manual. Basically every other car manufacturer does manual locks except for Tesla and a couple small (less than 10,000 units annually) companies. The thing is electric locks are cheaper, and when you don’t care about safety, you go for the cheapest option.
The real issue is that they can't be opened from the inside. Unless you locate the mechanical latch, which involves peeling off the rubber lining of the cupholder.
load more comments
(1 replies)
The ghost of Steve Jobs: “blow them shii smoove off”
load more comments
(2 replies)
I have similar style of handles on my car that the model 3, S, and Y have. The thing is the manufacturer made the handle manual while still being flush with the body, they even added a physical key hole so I can have access to the interior if the battery is dead, while still being flush with the body. It’s not hard to do manual, it’s safer, it just costs slightly more, and as we’ve seen in capitalism, lives are cheap. So what if it kills someone, you saved $5.
Is there some evidence that the electric handles are cheaper? You still need all of the same mechanical latches and linkages, but now add electric actuators and wiring. Intuitively it doesn't seem like it would be cheaper to me.
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
Recently there was a similar incident in China involving a Xiaomi car. This led to an incoming legislation that will require all cars to have mechanical handles in case of emergency.
Tesla alone had many such cases and there are no plans whatsoever to do anything about it.
Imagine losing to China in safety regulations.
Why not? China is developing while the US is sitting around with their thumb up their ass.
There are tons of valid criticisms of China but they seem to have their shit firmly together in many areas.
They're developing while we are unveloping.
load more comments
(5 replies)
In a normal car company, the CEO would be fired.
No, because nothing matters except stock price.
Musk's companies aren't evaluated based on their ability to sell products/services, they're valued on hype.
If he left any of his companies they would suffer drastic stock crashes which would likely kill the company.
Oddly enough Silicon Valley does a really good job of explaining how wonky the math gets.
"Normal" companies try to raise stock by making a product, these tech companies are basically exploiting glitch's in the stock market. It's why everyone else is losing.
There are layers to this.
No exterior door handles is a massive danger in the event of a crash that incapacitates those inside. No interoir door handles is a massive danger to those inside in the event of a crash that takes out the electrical system.
That said. Plenty of crashes will "disable" the doors just from the type of impact and so forth. And those tend to be the really bad ones.
Which is why EVERYONE should have, preferably a pair, of those car window breakers. Keep one handy to the driver and one either in the box between the driver and passenger or somewhere very visible in the back seat area.
In the event of a really bad crash? That is how you cut your seatbelt if it is jammed or you are otherwise unable to easily access it. And that is how you smash the glass to get out. And if you pull up to the side of an accident? That is how you get the injured driver out (keeping in mind all safety related concerns with moving someone who might have a spinal injury).
Just... also be aware that it has become increasingly popular (and not just among swasticars) to laminate many of the occupant windows. This DOES prevent shards of glass from flying into your face in the event a pickup truck tried to run you over. This ALSO makes escape a LOT harder. It is good to actually read your manual (or at least the labels on the windows) to know which ones you can escape from in the event of a crash.
But yeah., There is no fucking reason to remove mechanical door handles. But it is not THAT much of a danger in the event of a crash. Whereas it IS very much a deeply annoying hazard in the event of accidentally starting a firmware update with the door closed...
15 deaths directly as a result of doors failing to unlock, not because the door was smashed but because of electronic failure, is not THAT much of a danger?
Some of these incidents aren't even crashes. It's just battery malfunction, causing a fire and trapping the passengers.
And for nothing. Teslas do have a mechanical emergency release latch. It's just hidden.
load more comments
(3 replies)
110 people died in a car crash today in the USA alone.
Yikes! I better buy a bigger vehicle so that if I'm in a crash, I won't be the one getting crushed! /s
load more comments
(1 replies)
about 70 models currently on US roads sporting electric handles
So you can be mad at Tesla for making this popular but it's clearly not a Tesla specific problem anymore.
Its like manufacturers thought, "let's take these incredibly dangerous machines and make them less reliable."
I honestly dont get it.
load more comments
(1 replies)
I passionately hate the door handles on Teslas they are too perfect of a symbol of useless empty technological development that Tesla embodies. I can't swallow the firehose of poetic synchronicity it is too intense for me to be in close proximity to, my bitter sarcasm starts going haywire like a geiger counter near radioactive waste. Tesla door handles are affront to basic engineering principles and it terrifies me that the same guy who demanded them is allowed to own a company that sends humans to space.
view more: next ›