Elon Musk given special praise by Las Vegas police for help investigating Cybertruck blast outside Trump hotel

Thanks to the vehicle’s robust construction, several bystanders suffered only minor injuries in the explosion, which occurred right in front of the entrance to Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas on New Year’s Day.

Sheriff Kevin McMahill told reporters that the truck’s exterior barely showed signs of the blast, as the brunt of the force was propelled upward rather than outward.

“I have to thank Elon Musk specifically. He gave us quite a bit of additional information,” McMahill said at a press briefing on Wednesday. “He sent that directly to us, so I appreciate his help.”

The data provided included video footage captured at charging stations owned and operated by Tesla, as well as other vehicle analytics recorded by the company. 

The Cybertruck was rented via the Turo app two states east in Colorado before arriving in the city early on Wednesday morning, according to police.

No names have been released yet, but NBC affiliate KOAA in Southern Colorado cited multiple law enforcement officials saying the dead occupant of the Cybertruck was a 37-year-old resident of Colorado Springs.

The blast occurred roughly three weeks prior to Trump’s inauguration and just days before the casino city is due to host the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), the most important tech trade fair in the world that counted approximately 135,000 visitors last year.

Many of these CES visitors are likely to be shuttled from one end of the city’s convention center to the other via a fleet of Teslas operating in Musk’s Vegas Loop.

At this stage of the investigation, whether there was a political motivation behind the explosion remains unclear.

Musk has been the most influential backer of Trump, using his vast wealth and considerable media reach to help return the former president to the White House.

Jeremy Schwartz, the acting special agent in charge for the FBI’s Las Vegas office, confirmed his team is working together with local law enforcement to establish whether terrorism was the motive behind the explosion. 

‘Evil knuckleheads picked the wrong vehicle for a terrorist attack’

Musk said the explosion was evidence of just how durable his Tesla truck really is.

The vehicle uses a special grade of stainless steel that is impervious to many forms of damage. When the model first launched late in 2023, social media users posted hundreds of videos of people kicking, hammering, and even shooting up the vehicle to demonstrate just how tough the exterior is.

“The evil knuckleheads picked the wrong vehicle for a terrorist attack. Cybertruck actually contained the explosion and directed the blast upwards. Not even the glass doors of the lobby were broken,” wrote Musk.

The near tragedy occurred just as another electric pickup truck, a Ford F-150 Lightning, likewise rented out via Turo, plowed into a group of revelers in New Orleans’ French Quarter, killing more than a dozen people.

In a statement on Wednesday, Turo confirmed both vehicles had been procured via their peer-to-peer car rental app. 

“We do not believe that either renter had a criminal background that would have identified them as a security threat,” the company said, adding it was “devastated” by the news and was aiding law enforcement in their investigations.

Both instances took place in tourism magnets known for their vices, involved electric pickup trucks rented via Turo, and occurred just hours apart. But otherwise, there seems to be no direct connection.

While a flag of the militant jihadist group ISIS has been identified in the New Orleans attack, McMahill said he has no evidence thus far suggesting the Trump hotel explosion had any links to the Islamic State.

“We’re absolutely investigating any connectivity to what happened in New Orleans,” the Las Vegas sheriff added. “We’re not ruling anything out yet.”