When a man who regularly sends rockets into space says he’s got something that’ll “blow your mind clear of your skull,” you listen.
Elon Musk has left Tesla fans hyperventilating after hinting that the electric car maker could unveil a game-changing truck this week. “This will blow your mind clear out of your skull and into an alternate dimension. Just need to find my portal gun …,” Musk tweeted. The launch will be webcast live on Tesla’s site on Thursday.
Tesla Semi Truck unveil to be webcast live on Thursday at 8pm! This will blow your mind clear out of your skull and into an alternate dimension. Just need to find my portal gun …
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 12, 2017
This isn’t the first time Musk has mentioned that a truck would be added to Tesla’s growing arsenal. In April, Musk had teased viewers with an image of a truck during the TED conference. “This will be a very spry truck,” Musk had said during the conference. “You can drive it around like a sports car.”
The truck will, of course, be electric, and Reuters had reported in August that it would have a range of between 300 and 500 kilometers. Trucks are among the biggest consumers of gasoline, and switching over to electric trucks could help reduce pollution because of vehicular emissions. And Musk had said that a truck is a natural extension of Tesla’s electric cars.
“Most of that semi is actually made out of Model 3 parts, by the way,” Musk had said at the TED conference. “It’s using a bunch of Model 3 motors. We’re revealing too much about the future of it but … we’re able to use a very high-volume vehicle and then combine several motors to have something that I think is actually going to have a very good gross margin.” Musk has said that the truck will hit the roads in 2019.
Tesla’s electric truck won’t be the first in the market. A few companies such as Newton, E-Force 1 and Emoss already produce electric trucks that are either pure electric or hybrids. But Tesla is the biggest electric car producer in the world, and its foray into the production of trucks will likely shake up the industry. And with Musk already saying that the launch is going to something special, the world will be watching.