De-ICE-ing is happening at more places than just airports.
Last week, Business Insider reported on a spate of truck drivers parking in Tesla Supercharger spots and, in at least one case, harassing a Tesla owner. Other electric-vehicle drivers have come to call these incidents “ICE-ing,” an acronym for internal combustion engine.
That spurred an idea for Patrick Lawson: What if he could tow a gas-burning car out of the way if it was blocking a charger? And that’s exactly what he set out to see.
Using his sister’s Chevrolet Silverado 1500 pickup truck at the Loveland, Colorado, Supercharger, Patrick successfully moved the 5,000-pound truck.
Read more: Truck owners are blocking Tesla Superchargers in ‘ICE-ing’ protests
“It actually turned out to be incredibly easy to tow a pickup truck with a Tesla Model X,” Lawson said in a YouTube video about the test, which was first reported by the blog Teslarati. “I was going kind of slow to make sure we didn’t break anything or hit the curb or Supercharger. The car didn’t struggle in any way shape or form.”
Icy conditions (no pun intended) may have helped the towing, he said. The manual parking brake was not applied to the truck, though its automatic transmission was in park.
“I just keep seeing videos of people ICE-ing, and figured this would be a good de-ICE-ing video,” Lawson said. “All of us Tesla owners are super nice guys, and we don’t want any confrontation with these jerks that are blocking Superchargers.”
“If you need to, show them this video. If anything, they’re just a minor inconvenience,” he continued.
Have you experienced any issues at a Tesla charger? Let me know at grapier@businessinsider.com.