It’s a problem when none of the doors work. The only person that survived was because somebody not involved came and broke the window. They said they didn’t even know anybody else was in the car because the smoke was so thick. Not the best time to be searching for a hidden door handle. Admittedly the front doors manual release is way more accessible but they probably didn’t know it existed because it blends into the door panel.

Child safety locks still allow the door to be opened from the outside. Tesla’s doors won’t if there isn’t any power. You have to go dig through the interior panels for the stupid cable to pull. That assumes you are uninjured, conscious, and not panicking to even do that.

The C7 Chevy corvette has a similar issue because the doors are electronic. To put insult to injury the location of the manual release is in the owners manual…which is stored behind the radio screen that power retracts into the dash. So no power and you can’t get to the manual either. Brilliant.

In my Audis at least, the child safety is disabled together with the locks opening within a few milliseconds of the airbag control unit sending a crash signal across the CAN. That message is sent immediately when the decision to open at least one airbag has been made and therefore will reach all components while the crash hasn't even had time to finish, so all wires and stuff is most likely still in place

Apart from that, the doors have an emergency mechanical release that is "just pull a bit harder and further on the handle". Which is what you'd do anyway.

A: the driver knows they're locked from the inside

B: they're always locked form the inside, they didn't just stop working because the car lost power

C: lithium fire/smoke makes thinking more difficult than an ICE engine fire

EV complicates it

Tesla made it really bad by electric-only locks.