It’s a total Tesla recall.Faulty Tesla software affects almost nine in 10 electric vehicles on the road in Canada, according to the latest Statistics Canada data.On Wednesday, Transport Canada officially posted a recall notice which affects virtually every Tesla sold in this country since 2017, or about 193,000 units, for its faulty Autosteer or advanced driver assistance feature.By comparison, there are only 220,000 battery electric cars of all makes registered in the Great White North. And it is the first time a vehicle — any make or model — has been recalled for anything other than a mechanical issue..It’s essentially a software issue.According to Transport Canada’s website, the Tesla controls that monitor driver ‘engagement’ may not kick in with audible and visual alerts to warn the driver the feature is not available or about to disengage. That means a higher risk of a crash if the driver fails to realize it has been automatically shut off — or falls asleep at the wheel. It comes after a two-year investigation from the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) following 35 crashes affecting Tesla Evs stateside, killing at least 17 people.That includes a fatal crash in Virginia that resulted from the Autopilot improperly speeding through an intersection and was t-boned by a semi-trailer. It’s not immediately clear how many Teslas have the feature installed, because it is a subscription software feature — similar to a smart phone app. Nonetheless, it’s embedded in the central operating system of the car and as such, all models are capable of having it activated..More than two million of the trendy T-cars are being recalled in the US.Tesla owners are pushing back on the idea of a software update as a recall in the true sense of the term and are accusing regulators of unfairly targeting owner Elon Musk.But it illustrates the growing role of automation and software issues in a variety of transportation settings, not just cars. A similar software defect in Boeing’s 737 Max kicked in under certain conditions causing planes to crash. That glitch reportedly cost the company US$80 billion in direct and indirect costs.On Twitter (“X”), Tesla maintained its vehicles are still safer with the autopilot turned on and noted drivers still have to be alert at all times..Although Transport Canada notes the company will supply an “over-the-air” software update free of charge — owners don’t have to bring their cars into the dealership — it made the decision to include it in its recall database. It’s not the biggest, either. That distinction goes to Ford which recalled almost 835,000 of its late 1980s Mercury Cougars, Thunderbirds, Mustangs, Broncos and F-series trucks for faulty ignition switches that could catch fire.Total battery electric vehicle registrations in Canada — excluding hybrids — total about 0.9% of all cars on the road. Though Transport Canada doesn’t break them down by model, assuming that 90% of those Teslas are relatively evenly dispersed throughout the country that means about 85,000 of those are in Quebec and another 70,000 are in British Columbia.Alberta has about 6,500 EVs of any make on its roads.
