Tesla's Full Self-Driving software has a potentially catastrophic flaw that the company hasn't addressed publicly: it repeatedly fails to handle railroad crossings safely. Multiple Tesla owners reported their vehicles attempting to drive through active crossings, forcing emergency manual intervention to avoid collisions with trains.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) confirmed to NBC News they've been in communication with Tesla about these incidents. The agency stated: "We are aware of the incidents and have been in communication with the manufacturer."
The Pattern of Failures Is Disturbing
NBC News identified at least 47 incidents across Reddit, X, and YouTube since 2023, including recent cases from August 2025. The malfunctions include:
- Ignoring flashing warning lights and attempting to proceed through active crossings
- Failing to stop for lowered crossing gates or trying to drive around them
- Not detecting approaching trains despite clear visual and audio signals
- Stopping on railroad tracks when traffic lights ahead are red, creating dangerous exposure
- Turning directly onto train tracks instead of following roads
Italo Frigoli, a North Texas Tesla owner, experienced this firsthand when his 2025 Model Y with the latest FSD hardware (HW4) and software (v13.2.9) nearly drove through descending gate arms. NBC News documented the same failure when they returned to test the crossing a second time.
"It felt like it was going to run through the arms," Frigoli said. "So obviously I just slammed on the brakes."
Real Crashes Have Already Happened
In June, a Tesla in FSD mode drove itself onto train tracks in eastern Pennsylvania and was struck by a Norfolk Southern freight train. The driver and passengers evacuated before impact, avoiding serious injury when the train delivered only a glancing blow.
Western Berks Fire Commissioner Jared Renshaw, who interviewed the driver, explained: "They said when they got to the tracks, the car just turned left. The car was in self-driving mode, and it just turned left."
This incident received local news coverage but no public response from Tesla or acknowledgment of the systemic issue.
Here's Why Tesla's AI Keeps Fucking This Up
Carnegie Mellon's Phil Koopman nailed the problem: "If it's having trouble stopping at rail crossings, it's an accident waiting to happen. It's just a matter of which driver gets caught at the wrong time."
Tesla's FSD is basically a giant neural network trained on video footage. But here's the thing - if you don't show it enough examples of railroad crossings during training, it doesn't know what the fuck a railroad crossing is. Koopman thinks Tesla's engineers didn't bother collecting enough train crossing footage for their training data.
Railroad crossings aren't standardized either. Some have gates, lights, and clear stop lines. Others just have those white X signs that drivers ignore all the time. Tesla's AI can't figure out that "big metal thing on rails + flashing lights = don't drive here" because they never taught it properly.
Meanwhile, Waymo Figured This Shit Out Years Ago
Waymo basically cheats by avoiding railroad crossings whenever possible. When they can't avoid them, their cars actually listen for train sounds with audio receivers and they built a fucking model railroad crossing at their test facility to practice.
You know how many Waymo customers complain about almost getting hit by trains? Zero. Because Waymo treats railroad crossings like the death traps they are instead of pretending their AI is smart enough to figure it out on the fly.
MIT's Bryan Reimer put it well: Waymo actually invested in developing safety systems that work instead of just claiming everything's fine while people almost die.
Tesla's Marketing vs. Reality Gap
Here's the bullshit Tesla pulls: officially, FSD is a "Level 2" system that requires constant human supervision. But Musk keeps telling everyone that Tesla vehicles "can drive themselves." You can't have it both ways, Elon.
Tesla's been caught exaggerating their software capabilities before. A Miami jury awarded $243 million in a wrongful death case this summer, finding Tesla 33% responsible for an Autopilot crash. But sure, let's trust them with train crossings.
The Railroad Industry Saw This Coming in 2018
The Association of American Railroads warned regulators about this exact problem back in 2018. They pointed out that self-driving cars need to recognize locomotive lights, horns, and bells because not every crossing has fancy gates and signals.
Their warning was pretty clear: "Rail corridors must be afforded respect." Translation: don't let robots drive into fucking trains.
267 people died at railroad crossings last year according to the Federal Railroad Administration. They don't track which cars had Tesla's "self-driving" engaged, but they're aware of the Tesla incidents. That's not exactly reassuring.
Tesla's Promises vs. Reality
Musk has promised a major FSD update for late September 2025 but hasn't specifically addressed railroad crossing failures. This is particularly concerning given Tesla's robotaxi ambitions.
Tesla robotaxis are currently operating in Austin, Texas, and Musk plans to expand to cover half the U.S. population by year-end. Yet test riders have documented the same railroad crossing failures in the robotaxi service.
Joe Tegtmeyer, a Tesla booster who documented a robotaxi failure at an Austin rail crossing, described the vehicle beginning to move precisely as warning lights activated and gates descended. A Tesla employee had to intervene to prevent the vehicle from proceeding through the crossing.
Customer Trust Eroding
Even loyal Tesla customers are expressing frustration. Jared Cleaver, an Oakland Tesla owner who experienced multiple crossing failures, said: "It's kind of crazy that it hasn't been addressed."
"I think it doesn't perform nearly as well as Elon claims and Tesla claims," Cleaver added. "They seem to make a habit out of making these really big claims and then falling short. It seems like borderline false advertising."
The railroad crossing issue represents a fundamental safety flaw that undermines Tesla's autonomous driving claims. Until Tesla addresses this specific failure mode with transparent safety improvements, every FSD-enabled Tesla approaching a railroad crossing represents a potential tragedy waiting to happen.
For a company betting its future on autonomous technology, the inability to safely handle one of the most predictable and well-marked hazards on American roads raises serious questions about the readiness of Tesla's self-driving systems for unsupervised operation.