Public memory is short(how many remember the Top Gear review of model S now?). In few months people will forget about this episode. This may have negative short term impact(or may be not) on sales of Tesla cars/shareprice. But from Tesla's point of view, they got the following:

1) another test case, which they may not have accounted for, and they will use this to make future improvements

2) wide publicity, which may seem negative at this point, but lot more folks know now that it is possible to think of driving in electric cars outiside your city limits (it may not seem to have works as planned in this case), but nevertheless it is a possibility. CNN did another test ride, which again is more publicity.

Overall I see this as a net plus for Tesla in the long term.