As has only just become public, two police officers in Basel could not leave their Tesla during an operation because the doors did not open. It got weird.
After the police in Basel was one of the first in Europe to purchase electric vehicles, the use of Tesla vehicles is apparently not without problems. As the local online portal Prime News now reports, citing a previously unpublished mission log, two officers were trapped in their vehicle two years ago because the electronically controlled doors were blocked. When chasing a cyclist who was supposed to be checked, there were strange scenes, but under other circumstances, it could have been quite dangerous for the occupants.
Properly led by the nose
As the news portal summarizes, according to the protocol, the officials wanted to carry out a “personal and ID check” on two cyclists. One of the two drove on “undeterred”, whereupon the officials tried to get out of their Model X electric car: “However, this failed because the vehicle door was blocked.” The person on the bike noticed that and subsequently made fun of the prisoners. The “fugitive” drove in front of them at a walking pace and the officials were unable to stop him.
According to the log, the person on the bike eventually even drove towards the police Tesla and crashed into the vehicle. The front doors would still not open, but the rear left wing door would. One of the officers then had to climb through the 60 cm gap. The cyclist then wanted to flee but was held by the other police officer through the open window by the jacket. The policeman was finally able to leave the vehicle through the window. The overpowered man had drugs with him and was known to the police in nearby Germany.
The police have admitted to Prime News that the incident happened and that the quotes from the report are correct. Although such a case could have been extremely dangerous for the police officers in other operational scenarios, a police spokesman assured that the Teslas had fully proven themselves in everyday police work. You are still very satisfied. He also assured me that there had never been a case in which the team had not been able to leave a vehicle. How often it was so difficult, as in the case described, does not emerge from this.
Nissan instead of Tesla
The Basel police began using the Teslas in 2019, according to SRF as “one of the first police corps in all of Europe”. The overall balance is good, it was said at the beginning of 2021, the vehicles had proven themselves. The maintenance is no greater than for vehicles with combustion engines, charging is quick – also because the vehicles are not in continuous use. Nevertheless, the police authority decided on a different model when buying the next vehicles at the beginning of 2022. According to the newspaper biz, instead of Tesla’s Model X, eight Nissan Leafs were purchased at the time.
TechAint 