Four people were killed in western France late Saturday when a Tesla electric car caught fire for reasons not yet determined, prosecutors said Sunday. The accident occurred outside the city of Niort, causing the deaths of the driver and three passengers who were employees at a restaurant in nearby Melle, according to a source close to police.

"An inquiry has been opened to determine the causes and circumstances of the deadly accident, a probe during which expertise on the vehicle will be requested," a local judge told AFP.

"Everything suggests (the vehicle) came off the road," The Associated Press cited local police spokesman Lt. Eric Hoarau as saying. He noted marks on the ground and a road sign seemingly cut down by the vehicle as it left the road, and confirmed that an investigation was underway.

Hoarau told the AP there were no witnesses to the crash and the driver and three passengers were burnt beyond recognition and already dead when authorities arrived.

According to preliminary reports, the vehicle rammed into several road signs at high speed as it left the road, and the local Western Courier newspaper said it only came to rest many yards from where it initially veered off.

The newspaper, citing police, said the driver was a 65-year-old man from Niort and the three passengers were employees of a restaurant he frequented, aged 26, 21 and 16, whom he'd offered a ride in his car after work.

Tesla did not immediately reply to an AP request for comment and the auto company owned by billionaire tech magnate Elon Musk posted no statement on his social media platform X, previously called Twitter.

Tesla has frequently faced scrutiny over safety issues. In April, the carmaker settled with the family of an engineer killed when a Tesla Model X crashed in Silicon Valley in 2018, a move that avoided a trial.

The driver was on a California highway using the Tesla autopilot feature when the car drove into a concrete median, according to the lawsuit.

Earlier this month Tesla issued a recall for 27,185 of its Cybertruck vehicles because of visibility problems with their rearview cameras — the fifth recall for the stainless steel electric pickup truck since it hit the road at the end of 2023.

In December, Tesla recalled more than two million vehicles in the United States and Canada because of risks associated with the autopilot software and a potentially "increased risk of a collision", according to US national regulators.

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