You Need A Flashlight To Escape The Tesla Cybertruck Bed

The Tesla Cybertruck has been the subject of tons of bad press since its launch, ranging from embarrassing off-road performances to wheel covers that destroy its own tires. Now, an owner learned how difficult it is to escape the Cybertruck’s bed should you get trapped under its electronic tonneau cover. This is a serious safety issue, since a young child trapped under the Cybertruck’s standard tonneau cover is not likely to be able to escape due to Tesla’s poor design. Even adults without flashlights or cell phones would struggle.

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To escape from the Cybertruck’s bed, you have to remove a small black plastic panel on the tailgate that reveals two red fabric loops that pop open the tailgate. Fortunately, the truck’s tonneau cover design allows light to enter the bed through its cabin windows, but should this happen at night or in a dark garage, the task becomes nearly impossible unless you have a flashlight and you know what you’re looking for. While the Cybertruck bed has LED lights that illuminate the bed when the tonneau cover is open, these lights turn off as soon as the cover closes, leaving this TikToker or any other overly curious individual in total darkness.

It feels a bit irresponsible to shed light on this blinding flaw since it could potentially give people bad ideas, but it’s also important to illuminate this issue, and it’s important to publicize the way to escape a Cybertruck’s bed, since it’s convoluted and unintuitive. Tesla could fix this flaw very easily by making the panel covering the emergency release straps out of a clear plastic, or better yet by installing an illuminated release button. Many other automakers use glow-in-the-dark materials for the latches.

While Tesla’s Cybertruck does have a release latch accessible from inside the bed, it is not illuminated in any way, and it is hidden behind a cover that seamlessly blends into the bed liner. Should a small child end up locked inside of a Cybertruck’s bed, it’s not likely that the child would possess the dexterity or intuition to escape due to the complexity of Tesla’s emergency tailgate release straps. The Cybertruck features Tesla’s first fully electric front trunk, which features an illuminated emergency release button, so why wouldn’t Tesla do the same for the Cybertruck’s bed?

There is a Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard (FMVSS) that was enacted in the year 2000 that states that all new passenger cars with trunks be equipped with a release latch located inside of the trunk compartment. Most modern cars have either a backlit button that serves as an emergency trunk release, or a handle that glows in the dark so it’s obvious to anyone trapped in the trunk. Contrary to popular belief, this mandate was not necessarily made to prevent abductions; the NHTSA document cites the death of 11 children who were trapped in car trunks in the summer of 1998 as the main reason for enacting this regulation. If one of those children were to get stuck inside the bed of a Tesla Cybertruck on a hot day, the child’s likelihood of survival is low thanks to Tesla’s lazy and dangerous design.