GM: "human error" behind leak of 2011 Chevy Volt pics

Filed under: Hybrids/Alternative, Green, Chevrolet, GM

Click above for high-res gallery of the 2011 Chevy Volt

The hubbub from yesterday afternoon’s “leak” of images showing the production 2011 Chevy Volt has died down, and The Detroit News asked General Motors what we were all wondering: what the hell happened? Chevy PR dude Terry Rhadigan claims “human error” was behind the accidental release of production Volt images on GM’s own media website and one external media site. According to GM, the images were only published briefly before being removed from both sites. All it took were moments, however, for Marty Padgett to publish the pics on his website, thecarconnection.com. That’s where Autoblog first found them, though we were still able to download higher res versions from GM’s own media site by doing a simple search for ‘volt’. Padgett seems to think the accidental release of the pics was really an intentional move by GM to generate buzz for the car before its official debut early next week during the automaker’s centennial celebrations. Their release may have been intentional, or not. No one can know for sure and, quite honestly, we don’t really care.

Gallery: 2011 Chevy Volt