GoKawiilA Tesla Model 3 is shown driving on the highway with FSD 14.2.2.3 self-driving supervised software in Irvine, California, U.S., Jan. 28, 2026.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said on Monday that it has opened a special crash investigation into a Tesla incident where a Model 3 slammed into a home in Katy, Texas, killing 76-year-old Martha Avila.
Harris County authorities said that the driver, Michael Butler, was cooperating with their investigation on the scene and said that he had been using Tesla's partially automated driving systems when his vehicle barreled out of its lane and into the home in the Houston suburb.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk went on the defensive, saying in a post on his social network X Monday that the crash "makes no sense."
"FSD drives slowly through neighborhood streets and this was a high speed crash!" he wrote, referring to his company's partially automated driving systems.
Tesla Vice President of Autopilot Ashok Elluswamy also chimed in on the incident with a response to Musk on X.
"In this case, the driver manually overrode self-driving by pressing the accelerator all the way to 100% of the accel pedal in this residential area," he wrote. "They reached a speed of 73 mph during the crash, and had the accelerator pressed even after the crash."
The driver's claim, and the Tesla executives' claims, are still under investigation and have not been independently verified.