An accident at Tesla’s Fremont factory has led to a $51 million lawsuit, with one employee claiming he was left with grievous injuries and millions in medical bills after being struck by a production-line robot. The case raises some questions not just about workplace safety but also about the role of automation in high-pressure manufacturing environments.
According to court documents seen by The Independent, 50-year-old employee Peter Hinterdobler was injured on July 22, 2023, while helping an engineer disassemble a large robot from the Model 3 production line. After attempting to “remove the motor at the base of the robot in order to access its internal dress pack,” the robot’s arm struck Hinterdobler with “the force of an approximately 8,000-pound counterbalance weight,” says the lawsuit.
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