NTSB report: Tesla driver mentioned problem before 2018 crash.

A San Mateo man who died when his Tesla Model X car crashed on Highway 101 almost two years ago had complained on several occasions that his vehicle’s navigation system often steered his car toward the barrier where his eventual fatal accident occurred, according to a new report from federal investigators.

The National Transportation Safety Board on Tuesday released hundreds of pages of documents as part of its preliminary report on the March 23, 2018, accident involving 38-yearold Walter Huang. Huang was the only person in the Tesla Model X when the car hit a barrier on southbound Highway 101, and he died shortly after the accident at a local hospital.

According to the NTSB, Huang’s family members said he had complained to them, and Tesla, about his vehicle’s Autopilot system malfunctioning and its steering of his car toward the Highway 101 barrier on different occasions. In the NTSB documents, Mark Fong, an attorney representing Huang’s family, wrote that Huang had complained that his car “would veer toward the barrier in the mornings when he went to work.”

Autopilot is an automated-driving function available in Tesla cars that

helps a car stay in its lane and maintain a safe distance from other cars. Tesla has stressed on multiple occasions that using Autopilot

doesn’t give its cars selfdriving capabilities.

In response to NTSB questions, Fong also said that Huang had brought his Model X vehicle in to a Tesla service center on two occasions after he took delivery of the car in November 2017 in order to get service

for a firmware update, a malfunctioning door and a navigation error.

Fong wrote that when it came to the Model X’s navigation error, “Tesla said they couldn’t duplicate the navigation error, so it remained unfixed.”

Huang’s family is suing

Tesla for wrongful death and the California Department of Transportation for failing to properly maintain the section of Highway 101 where Huang’s car crashed.

Investigators determined that Huang’s Model X was traveling at 71 miles

per hour at the time of his accident. The NTSB said the barrier involved in Huang’s accident had been struck by cars on at least five occasions in the three years leading up to Huang’s crash.

Neither Tesla nor Caltrans responded to a request

for comment on the NTSB report.

The NTSB is scheduled to hold a hearing and determine a final cause of Huang’s accident on Feb. 25.