Exclusive images: At least six Tesla Model Y crossovers arrive in Australia

At least six Tesla Model Y electric crossovers have landed in Australia, and four of those arrived in Melbourne on Thursday after a long cold journey on a truck from Sydney.

The sighting has drawn great excitement from drivers waiting for the opportunity to order the EV maker’s electric crossover. It was originally thought Tesla would launch the vehicle in late 2021 when Australian certification documents were published, but this did not eventuate.

Then, when a temporarily live Model Y order page enabled a customer to make an order in April hopes were up yet again, only to be let down when the live order page disappeared and the customer’s order was cancelled.

Now, at least two trucks carrying Model Ys have been spotted in the last 24 hours. Two of the Model Ys were snapped by a member of a Tesla owner’s group (see bottom of article – and there may have been more on that truck), and four more were snapped by Carloop’s Riz Akhtar.

The Driven can share exclusive images of the new Model Ys that, it would appear, have arrived for local homologation. The Driven has reached out to Tesla for confirmation but the EV maker does not have a public or media relations department.

Akhtar snapped the exclusive images of the vehicles after they arrived in Melbourne, which likely arrived on the only shipment of Tesla cars from Shanghai this quarter.

“All cars were in “Transport” mode (and) seem to be different from those first spotted on a freeway,” says Akhtar.

Obtaining numerous up-close and full-length shots of the vehicles, Akhtar was able to confirm the following details:

• The shipment included 2 Performance and 2 RWD (SR) models
• These cars were delivered from Sydney to Melbourne
• No badging was seen on the rear of the car
• These vehicles had an “AU” sticker on the side
• This was accompanied by an LRW Vin number, indicating they were made in China

“The acceleration observed once unloaded off the truck clearly showed the Performance model’s oomph over the LFP based RWD ones,” he added.

Tesla shipping tracker @Vedaprime was also able to confirm that a new Road Vehicle Descriptor was published on the Department of Infrastructure’s ROVER website on June 1, 2022.

These documents (see below) show that three variants have been certified for sale in Australia, although the existence of just the two variants in this latest shipment suggests Tesla may only make the RWD and Performance available initially.

The shipment was first spotted in transit on the M1 and shared on Tesla Owners Australia Facebook group by group member Michelle Price.

“Holy smokes these are Model Y!” declared Tom from Ludicrous Feed. “See how the bottom of the lift gate goes below the line of the rear bumper. This is not a drill people.”