“Eerie” footage has emerged of hundreds of unused Teslas sitting idle at a disused shopping mall car park, with witnesses saying the sight was made even more “creepy” after an empty one abruptly pulled out of its bay and drove off.
The footage, taken late last month outside of the now-defunct Chesterfield Mall in Missouri in the US, shows hundreds of brand new Teslas — including a number of the controversial Cybertrucks — sitting in silence in the expansive parking lot.
The woman who posted the video claims to be an explorer of abandoned locations. She was visiting the mall to film for content when she stumbled upon the unsettling sight. “What the heck is going on?” she said in the video. “Look how [many] Cybertrucks and Teslas there are.”
The woman films various parts of the car park, before she suddenly stops and realises one is moving on its own. While it’s no secret some Tesla models feature autonomous driving, the woman and her companion were spooked to see one reverse itself out of a spot and “sped off” into the distance on its lonesome.
“Dude, no one’s driving them, they are driving themselves. It just drove away with nobody in it,” she said.
As the pair tour around the car park, other empty models are seen with their blinkers on. Some so new they’re even still covered in plastic.
While the footage left many people “freaking out” in the comments, there’s actually quite a reasonable explanation for the bizarre sight. As it turns out, Tesla in fact rents out multiple car parks across the US, due to capacity issues at dealerships.
In Chesterfield for example, about 40 kilometres from St Louis, a reported 400 Teslas, including dozens of Cybertrucks are stored at the abandoned mall, which closed its doors in August.
“[Tesla] does not have enough capacity at the [local] dealership to park all of the cars they are bringing in,” Tim Lowe, senior vice president of leasing for The Staenberg Group, told FOX 2 earlier this year. “So they are renting space within the parking lot to store their cars.”
Online, people were left in awe at the sight.
“Bro, I just got a chill,” one spooked person said. Many others said the post-apocalyptic film, Leave the World Behind, was “the first thing that came to mind”.
At least one person saw the funny side, commenting: “That’s where your Tesla goes to hang out when you’re not watching.”
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