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- Actor Jamie Lynn Spears called Tesla a “cat-killer” on Friday, before walking back her comments.
- Her cats didn’t hear Tesla cars approaching because of their quiet engines, the actor said.
- “Elon Musk, let’s figure this out,” she added. “You owe me a couple cats.”
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Actress Jamie Lynn Spears on Friday appeared to blame Tesla for the death of her cats.
Tesla’s quiet electric vehicles meant her cats didn’t hear cars approaching, the actor claimed.
“We have now lost – I don’t want to tell you how many cats – because they don’t hear the Tesla crank and unfortunate things happen and it’s really devastating and tragic for everyone involved,” she said in a since-deleted Instagram video posted Friday.
“Somebody’s gotta let Elon Musk know that Tesla is a secret cat-killer,” Spears said in the video.
“Elon Musk, let’s figure this out,” Spears said. “You owe me a couple cats.”
After a confused reaction to her post, with some fans questioning whether Spears was actually responsible for the deaths, she clarified that she had not run over any cats, per OK! Magazine.
"Tesla is not to be blamed and was never intended to be," she added in an Instagram update, which she also later deleted.
In her original post, Spears proposed that, "since the Tesla is so quiet," the cars could make a noise to alert cats of their presence, though she also noted that the deaths could be down to user error.
However, cars making a noise is already a legal requirement, CNN noted, referring to a US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration policy from September, which requires electric and hybrid vehicles to make sounds of at least 43 decibels when traveling at less than 18.6mph.
This is so pedestrians, including those who are visually impaired, know when the vehicles are approaching.
Tesla did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Tesla, which fell just short of its goal of 500,000 vehicle sales in 2020, is expected to continue recording booming sales in 2021.
The company could hit 1 million vehicle deliveries by 2022, and 5 million by the end of the decade, according to Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives.
Over the past month, it has begun producing Model Y vehicles in China and registered a company in India, the two most populous countries in the world.