In case you thought cars would become safer as technology developed… rest assured, Tesla is finding newer and ever-dumber ways to make their cars dangerous to occupants (and others).
TL;DR: If you’re in a Tesla and it loses power (like in a fire), the only way to open the doors is often an unlabeled wire behind either two panels or a speaker grill. Tesla owners are DIYing janky rip cords to make that wire easier to pull to escape.
You are correct, I had terms swapped around in my head. Tempered glass is what glass break devices were designed for. Newer cars are swapping their tempered glass windows for laminated glass windows which traditional glass break devices do not work on.
Yeah, there a few cars out there that do have safety glass rather than just tempered glass installed as side windows. But they are fairly uncommon due to the high cost and at least one engineer’s thought that safety glass might not be the safest thing in that application. Because it does make it more difficult to quickly gain access to an injured person if needed.
I think BMW has a couple models with safety glass for side windows. But it’s been a hot minute since I have needed to concern myself with such minutia.