A Tesla Cybertruck exploded and burst into flames Wednesday morning just outside the entrance of Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas, killing a person inside the vehicle and injuring several others standing nearby, local officials said.
The suspicious blast is being investigated as a possible terrorist attack, three senior law enforcement members briefed on the matter told NBC News. A motive has yet to be established.
The blast came hours after a driver in a rented pickup truck who was flying an ISIS flag plowed into New Year’s Eve revelers on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, killing at least 15 and injuring more than 30 others before he was shot dead by police.
That pickup truck and the Tesla in the Las Vegas explosion were rented from the same company, Turo, said Clark County/Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Sheriff Kevin McMahill.
“I don’t know,” McMahill said when asked at a news conference whether the two incidents are connected. “But we are investigating whether there is any connectivity.”
Turo, in a statement, said the company is actively aiding investigators.
“We do not believe that either renter involved in the Las Vegas and New Orleans attacks had a criminal background that would have identified them as a security threat,” the company said.
McMahill said officials know the Tesla was rented in Colorado but declined to divulge the name of the person who died in the inferno.
“We do know who rented this truck,” he said, adding they have found no link to ISIS or any other terrorist organization.
“We believe this is an isolated incident,” added Jeremy Schwartz, the FBI’s acting special agent in charge of the investigation.
McMahill said officials were able to track the route the Tesla took to Las Vegas with the help of Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who provided video of the Cybertruck at Tesla charging stations.
The Tesla arrived at 7:30 a.m. in Las Vegas and exploded an hour later, about 15 seconds after it got to the hotel, the sheriff said.
McMahill showed video of the explosion at an evening news conference. “So the individual who was in the truck is obviously deceased,” he said.
Earlier, Musk, who is also a top Trump adviser, insisted on X that the explosion had nothing to do with the vehicle.
“We have now confirmed that the explosion was caused by very large fireworks and/or a bomb carried in the bed of the rented Cybertruck and is unrelated to the vehicle itself,” Musk declared. “All vehicle telemetry was positive at the time of the explosion.”
McMahill confirmed there were gasoline cannisters and large fireworks mortars in the back of the truck.
“I don’t know how they were ignited,” the sheriff said. “We haven’t been able to process the vehicle yet.”
McMahill also reiterated that “there does not appear to be any further threat to our community now.”
Meanwhile, in New York City, extra police officers were assigned to Trump Tower as a precaution and the security perimeter was expanded to keep the public and traffic further away from the building, an NYPD spokesperson said.
Security at the Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago has also been boosted, police there confirmed.
The explosion outside Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas was reported about 8:40 a.m. local time, police said.
“We were told that a 2024 Cybertruck pulled up to the front of the hotel, and, in fact, I can tell you it pulled right up to the glass entrance doors of the hotel,” McMahill said at an earlier press conference. “We saw smoke start showing from the vehicle, and then an explosion from the truck occurs.”
Clark County Deputy Fire Chief Thomas Touchstone said that as first responders began to extinguish the fire, they “realized at the same time that there were multiple persons with injuries located around the vehicle.”
Of the seven people injured, Touchstone said, two were taken to University Medical Center of Southern Nevada in Las Vegas. But the injuries of all seven people are considered minor, he said.
