On September 21, 2026, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Office of Defects Investigation opened preliminary evaluation PE26007 into driver-assistance hardware that no automaker built or sold. The devices are the comma three, comma 3X and comma four, aftermarket units from comma.ai that run the open-source openpilot software, and the agency puts the estimated population at 30,000. Its opening document counts five crashes and three deaths.
All five involved a vehicle with a comma device striking a stopped or slowly moving vehicle in the same travel lane.
PE26007 and ODI’s crash tally
The opening resume for PE26007 lists the 30,000 figure as an estimated population and records five crashes, with three deaths spread across two fatal incidents and injuries in four of the five. ODI wrote that it had confirmed the systems were powered on or engaged in multiple of those crashes. That wording matters: the agency is not saying the software was steering in all five, only that engagement is established in several and under examination in the rest.
A preliminary evaluation is the first formal rung of an ODI defect inquiry. It can be closed, upgraded to an engineering analysis, or lead to a recall request. The document makes no finding of a defect. It says the office will evaluate “system performance and safeguards that are intended to ensure safe operation,” and it names the specific behavior in question: whether the devices adequately detected and responded to vehicles ahead in the lane.
How the agency came to the case is spelled out in the same file. The initial discovery involved vehicles that “reportedly struck stopped or slowly moving vehicles within the same travel lane,” and ODI is examining crashes involving comma-equipped vehicles “occurring under similar circumstances.” The investigation therefore covers a pattern of one crash type, not every way a driver-assistance device could fail, and the product list takes in the comma three, comma 3X, comma four and the openpilot software they run.
The same document describes openpilot as an open-source advanced driver-assistance system that works on more than 325 car models and “can drive for hours without intervention.”
Aftermarket hardware, open-source forks
Comma.ai markets the comma four for $999 as “a hands-off, eyes-on driving experience,” with lane centering and adaptive cruise control, and says its software runs on 350-plus models from 27 brands, according to the company’s own site. Because the buyer installs it, no manufacturer is a party to the sale, and that is what separates this inquiry from the ordinary automaker recall that NHTSA handles every week.
The Autopian’s reporting calls the product a Level 2 system: it takes over steering, braking and the powertrain, but the human behind the wheel is still the driver. The outlet also flags a practical snag. Openpilot has many independent forks, including Sunnypilot and Bluepilot, so a fix to the main branch would not automatically reach every variant on the road. ODI’s own document anticipates this by listing modified software versions among the things it will assess.
Three named crashes and comma’s answer
Electrek’s review of the case file names three of the incidents: a Toyota RAV4 that hit a stopped first-responder vehicle in Louisiana in February 2026, a Honda Accord that rear-ended a stopped car at 82 mph in Missouri in September 2025, and a Toyota Corolla that struck a stopped passenger car at 56 mph in Utah in July 2026. The outlet attributes the three deaths and the injuries to the five crashes as a group and does not tie each to a single event.
Comma’s filings with the agency, Electrek reports, open with a disclaimer that the company provides information “without agreeing with NHTSA’s interpretations or conceding that comma is obligated to respond.” The company argues that it does not manufacture vehicles and that braking responsibility sits with automakers’ adaptive cruise control. George Hotz, who founded comma.ai, has history here: the company cancelled its first product, the comma one, in 2016 after pressure from the same agency.
Brand-specific compatibility is part of the picture too. RivianTrackr notes that support for the Rivian R1S and R1T was added in openpilot 0.9.8 for 2022 through 2024 models, and that early reports described the software leaning on Rivian’s radar for distance control. Its founder, Jose Castillo, offered the only caution in the piece: “just be careful” with open-source driving technology.
Hardware sold directly to drivers also leaves open who would carry out any remedy. A conventional recall runs through a manufacturer’s dealer network and owner database, and neither exists for a retrofit box bought online. ODI’s stated scope covers system performance and safeguards, not the logistics of getting a remedy to owners.
The record so far rests on five crashes against an estimated 30,000 devices, and on ODI’s stated plan to test how the hardware and its forks behave when a slower vehicle sits in the lane ahead.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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