A 71-year-old man was killed early on Thursday 22 October 2026 when a Tesla hit him as he walked across westbound Interstate 80 in Vallejo, California. The driver, a 26-year-old from San Francisco, stopped, stayed at the scene and told California Highway Patrol (CHP) officers that the car was in Full Self-Driving mode, ABC7 reports, citing CHP's Solano Area office.
What CHP says happened
The crash was reported at about 2:35 a.m. local time at the I-780 interchange. CHP reviewed footage from the Tesla's own dashcam. According to the agency, the car was travelling at about 70 mph (113 km/h) in the second lane from the left when the man stepped onto the freeway from the right shoulder and walked towards the centre divider, directly into its path.
"The video showed the Tesla's brakes being applied as the vehicle steered to the left in an effort to avoid the pedestrian. Despite these evasive actions, the right front portion of the Tesla struck the individual," CHP said.
At least one more vehicle then hit the man as he lay in the traffic lanes. No other driver stopped, and that vehicle has not been identified. The man was pronounced dead at the scene, Hoodline reports. CHP has not released his name and is asking witnesses to contact its Solano Area office.
What is established, and what is not
That FSD was engaged is, for now, the driver's account. CHP's statement does not name the Tesla's model or its software version. The footage it describes shows that the car braked and steered, but not whether the software or the driver did so.
The claim can be tested. If Autopilot or FSD was engaged in the 30 seconds before impact, Tesla has to report a fatal crash like this one to NHTSA under the US regulator's Standing General Order, so the federal file will eventually show whether the system was driving.
This is the second serious crash on I-80 in Solano County in nine days in which a Tesla driver has said FSD was in control. On 13 October a Tesla drove into a flare-lit closure in Fairfield and hit a CHP patrol car, and its driver said he had been asleep. The two cases are not alike. In Fairfield the car did not react to a lit closure. In Vallejo, the footage CHP describes shows a car trying to avoid a pedestrian who walked onto a 70 mph freeway in the dark. The Verge notes that after the Fairfield crash CHP reminded drivers that "despite its name, full self-driving is not fully autonomous".
Why it matters in Europe
FSD is already under federal scrutiny in the US. NHTSA's engineering analysis of traffic-law violations such as red-light running covers about 2.9 million cars, and a separate analysis of crashes in poor visibility points at Tesla's decision to remove radar.
In Europe, FSD (Supervised) is legal in nine countries and had more than 100,000 customers at the end of September, according to Tesla's third-quarter results. Every European approval so far rests on the driver supervising at all times, and the EU-wide decision cannot come before the December meeting of the committee that votes on it. Nothing changes for European owners. What Tesla reports to NHTSA about Vallejo and Fairfield will show whether FSD was in control in either crash.