European Road Safety Orgs Are Terrified of the Cybertruck
Over half a dozen NGOs—including the European Road Safety Council and the International Federation of Pedestrians—recently co-signed an open letter arguing that Elon Musk’s bulky monstrosity poses numerous threats to European road safety. The letter was inspired by the recent decision by the Czech Republic to register one of Tesla’s trucks as a passenger vehicle, thus allowing it entry to the continent. According to the safety orgs, the owner of the car in question may have illegally misreported the vehicle’s weight as a means of getting it certified as a legitimate import to the country.
Now, the road safety advocates seem to feel that Tesla’s electric Hummer-like heap could spell big trouble for Europeans—and that the vehicles need to be kicked out of Europe, with extreme prejudice. “It is our assessment that the approval and registration of Cybertrucks in the EU poses illegal risks to all other road users,” the letter reads. “If this analysis is accepted, it follows that the small number of Cybertrucks registered so far in the EU need to be de-registered, with the relevant Member State/s confirming their removal from public roads.”
Why are the safety orgs so worried about Tesla’s truck? I guess it’s because it seems so obviously dangerous. “The Cybertruck fails to meet a range of basic European road safety norms that apply to passenger cars (M1),” the letter notes. “As outlined below, these range from the Cybertruck’s inadequate, or non-existent, crumple zones for crash absorption to its sharp edges.”
