Over the past day or so, we've seen some images floating around social media of a Tesla Supercharger cable cleanly (and intentionally) cut. While it seems quite clear it's a Supercharger cable, and it wasn't severed or cut by accident, there weren't many details.
Take a look at one of the related tweets:
It appears the cable was cut at a brand-new Tesla Supercharger station in Oakhurst, California. The station has a total of eight high-speed V3 Supercharger stalls, and reportedly, every last one of them not only had its cable cut clean off, but the cables themselves were stolen by the vandal.
Tesla fans and owners were just rejoicing about the opening of the new Supercharger station. As demand for Tesla's vehicles has grown exponentially, the company has been trying to quickly expand its DC fast charging network to keep up with vehicle sales. While it has proven impossible for Supercharger growth to keep up with Tesla's deliveries, the company has been successful in expanding the network significantly.
We've seen and covered a whole host of vandalism directed at Tesla over the years, though much of it was caught on camera by Tesla's built-in dashcam (TeslaCam) and camera-based Sentry Mode security systems. However, that wasn't the case this time. Instead, Tesla owners discovered the missing cables when they arrived at the new station to charge their cars.
While the recent incident in California could simply be more Tesla vandalism, many people are speculating that the vandals were likely looking to get their hands on the copper inside the cables. Moreover, they could have wanted the heavy-duty cables for their overall material value, though the copper would make the most sense.
Tesla's charging stations, much like other rival charging stations, are typically unattended. In addition, most are open 24 hours. As far as we understand, it's also uncommon for the stations to have any sort of video-based security systems.
One can only hope a Tesla owner was parked at the site at some point and may have Sentry Mode video, but thus far, it doesn't appear that's the case, as the vandals may have been wise not to act if a vehicle was present.
