Public Service Announcement: How to Stop a Runaway Toyota
10 Mar
Did you hear about the driver in Southern California who called 911 yesterday to report he was driving an out of control Toyota Prius on the interstate? The accelerator on the car had gotten stuck, and it took the driver a full twenty minutes to bring the car to a halt. This, only after a Highway Patrolman coached him over his patrol car’s loudspeaker to apply both the foot break and emergency break at the same time.
Most readers probably know Toyota is having a lot of trouble right now, mainly because this accelerator problem has become relatively common.
Let me share a word of advice to all you Toyota owners reading this blog: if the accelerator on your death-trap sticks, don’t employ the foot break and emergency break to slay that dragon. Take the simpler and safer approach: TURN OFF THE IGNITION.
A public service announcement from westcoastwitness.com
Tags: accelerator, accelerator sticking, runaway toyota, toyata, toyota accelerator, toyota accelerator malfunction
Um… if you just turn off the ignition the power steering won’t work anymore. That’s pretty dangerous too.
You’d rather continue careening down the highway? YOU LIE!
p.s. – when are you coming to visit?
Or put it in neutral.
Woah – even better. Then you keep your power steering.
Don’t these cars have keyless ignitions? I know the 911 dispatcher instructed the man to put the car in neutral and he said he was just trying to keep it under control, so he couldn’t.
Maybe this guy just made this up to get a BIG settlement from Toyota.
Maybe so. Either way it doesn’t appear he’ll be voted the brightest bulb in the chandelier anytime soon.
The Prius owner I know says the power steering still works even with the ignition off.
Seems like an elementary driver education FAIL here. If engine is revving out of control, turn it off or put it in neutral. Done.
The writer of this article needs to check his spelling. The part of the car that makes is stop is the BRAKES.
Yeah Kev – apparently brakes alone didn’t work for this guy.
This is funny. Ideally you can shift down (assuming it had a few lower gears like 1,2,2 like normal cars) from D to 2 and then a few seconds later to 1 in order to slow down the vehicle. After shifting to 1 the car will slow a bit and you can put it in neutral and apply pressure to the break. The shifts would have to be timed well however because the accelerator would still be going. As someone else stated, worst case scenario, go straight to neutral and apply pressure to the break. no matter what you do, depending upon the rate of acceleration, the car is probably going to have some problems by the time it finally stops.
The car also has a “B” mode which is electronic breaking. With this engaged it mimics an air pump in creating the slowing of the engine. It is similar to having a standard shifting system where you lower the gear rather than waste your breaks. It slows you down and will eventually bring you the 10mph or less.
Thought that would be interesting. Anyway, still a very funny/tragic story. Toyota is probably losing TONS of money right now.
I meant to add: this goes to show you that it pays to read your car user manual before you find out it wont stop