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Flying Car, Falling Sales
Tesla’s Roadster finally flew. The forecast it was supposed to crown quietly disappeared.
Last night, at a SpaceX test site outside Waco, Texas, a Tesla drove up a curved ramp until it hung upside down, held to the surface by fans sucking it against the track. Then it let go. Compressed-gas thrusters rolled it upright in mid-air; it hovered for a moment, and it dropped onto the tarmac in a cloud of smoke. In a second stunt, it jumped over a row of Tesla’s own vehicles and a semi-truck, flipping on the way over.
Nine years after its first appearance, the next-generation Roadster has been unveiled. It was promised for 2020.
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The clips circulated worldwide before the stage lights went out. Almost nobody asked the questions that matter.
What was actually shown
The stunts were real. Reporting from the event describes them as live, in front of an audience, which Musk had said in advance he wanted there to vouch that it was not AI.
The numbers are a different matter. Tesla says the car hit 0 to 60 mph (about 97 km/h) in 0.81 seconds. That is Tesla’s own claim. It first played a recording of a roughly…
