Tesla racks up recalls

The Austin, Texas, company has issued 15 recalls since January—four in the past two weeks—while federal regulators increase scrutiny on its electric vehicles. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is conducting multiple investigations into the company’s safety features, including a possible autopilot malfunction that might have caused 12 crashes into parked police and emergency vehicles. CEO Elon Musk reported his company made $5.5 billion in 2021 and delivered a record 936,000 vehicles.

What are the problems? The latest recall targets “Boombox” software on roughly 570,000 cars that allow drivers to play sounds while the vehicles are moving, which violates a federal pedestrian warning noise requirement. Last week, Tesla recalled nearly 54,000 vehicles over reports that their “full self-driving” feature did not completely halt the car at stop signs, violating state law. The company recalled a record 817,000 cars on Feb. 3 because seat belt chimes did not go off when drivers were not buckled, another federal law. Safety advocates are calling on the NHTSA to start fining the company for repeated safety violations.

Dig deeper: Read Onize Ohikere’s report on the NHTSA’s investigation into Tesla’s now-recalled video gaming feature.