Tesla crashes into Katy home, kills woman, injures two

A Tesla slammed through a home on Rose Hollow Lane in Katy on Friday night, killing a woman in her mid-70s and sending two people to hospitals in a wreck that rattled the Westgreen Park community near Westgreen and Highland Knolls. Harris County investigators still have to determine how the vehicle ended up in the front of the house and what role the driver’s claimed Autopilot setting played.

The crash happened at about 8:30 p.m. in the 21,300 block of Rose Hollow Lane near Park Brush Lane. Officials said the Tesla struck the front of the residence and pinned the woman inside. She was flown by Lifeflight to Memorial Hermann and later pronounced dead by the Harris County Sheriff’s Office. The driver, an adult man, was taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital after telling investigators he had the Tesla on Autopilot at the time of the crash.

Harris County Precinct 5 deputies, the Harris County Sheriff’s Office Vehicular Crimes Division and the Harris County ESD 48 Fire Department responded to the scene. Katy Magazine reported that multiple occupants were reportedly trapped inside the Tesla and that the driver sustained minor injuries. The crash left one resident dead, others hospitalized and a suburban street in west Harris County folded into an active crime-and-crash scene as investigators worked the block. The investigation remains ongoing.