Another Toyota Vehicle Goes Out Of Control In California
By Audrey Howard on March 9, 2010, 6:31 amThe California Highway Patrol was alerted by a 911 call that another Toyota (NYSE:TM) vehicle was speeding out of control. This time it was the Totoyta Prius.
Car On The Run
The owner of a blue Toyota Prius placed an emergency call to 911 at 1:30 pm today to report that his car’s accelerator was stuck and that he couldn’t slow it down. The car was racing eastbound on Interstate 8 near San Diego and the driver could do nothing to stop the car that was, at one point, traveling as fast as 90 miles per hour. The man could not turn the engine off or even put the car in neutral. The 20 minute event was a scary one for the driver as well as highway patrol. In order to stop the out of control Prius, the highway patrol had to put his patrol car in the line of fire and slam on the brakes. The car finally stopped without any injuries. Highway patrol had considered using a spike strip to slow the car down, but feared the driver would lose control of the car and would crash.
Irony
The story gets spicier when you throw in the mix the fact that this is the very day that Toyota has sent their best to retaliate against claims that the cars are out of control due to an electronics glitch in a news conference. It seemed that the conference was specifically set up to bash critics and the news media for all the facts surrounding their case. To date, 52 deaths have been linked to unintended acceleration in Toyota vehicles. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration continues to receive complaints from consumers who have had their recalled vehicles repaired only to be facing the same problems they had before the repair.
Related posts:
- Toyota & Fed Investigations Find Prius Brakes Were Not Fully Applied
- GM Recall: Feds Can’t Even Control Their Own Company Let Alone Toyota
- NASA Brought In To Help Solve Toyota’s Recall Problems
- Toyota President Not To Testify Before Congress But Sending Spokesman
- Toyota Recall Hysteria Growing Concern For The Automaker
“In order to stop the out of control Prius, the highway patrol had to put his patrol car in the line of fire and slam on the brakes.”
Actually, that’s not how it went, according to several other accounts. The officer used his loudspeaker to coach the driver into using a combination of brake pedal and emergency brake to stop the car, got the car stopped, and then pulled in front of the Prius as a precaution.
I know, it’s not as dramatic, and dramatic stories make Toyota look bad. And that’s what we’re all about these days. But that seems to be the way it went–not how you describe it here.
How dumb can a person be? You have time to call 911 but you are not smart enough to shut the car off or bump it out of gear. A person who does not know those two simple steps should not be on the highway.
What a load of rubbish. There is nothing wrong with Toytoa. It is the best make of car. I have had plenty of other brands but always came back to Toyota and NEVER had any problem with any of my Toyotas. The worst car I ever had was a Chevrolet Matiz, I got it brand new and only kept it for a year it was so bad. It had faulty starter, never knew if the car would start or not, it had faulty electrics,all the pedals were rubbish, the paintwork peeled off and became pitted with little holes, the gasket went and I had to wait weeks for a new part, the car had no power to drive up a small hill, it just rolled back down – good thing no other car was behind me that day.The roof leaked in from the area where the ariel was, the driver seat was not secure (I am not a heavy person, 8 stone), the rubber seals were no good, they had started to perish. I had a Ford Fiesta one time and sparks flew out from the pedals. The Chevrolet had faulty gears, it would refuse to change gears when driving along, or would go into 2 gears at the same time, it was a manual car not an automatic. I HAVE YET TO SEE CHEVROLET HAVING A RECALL. In my opinion the best place for a Chevrolet is in the dump, it is the worst car I have ever driven and I was GLAD to get rid of it. I hated every minute in that car. It was in the Chevrolet garage lots of times and they could not fix it. They gave me a courtesy car and it was just as bad , the only extra fault it had was a strange noise from the back of the car.Cornering was rubbish. There were other brands that had recalls about sticking accelerator problems in recent years: Volkswagen, Land Rover, Fiat Scudo, Volvo C30, S40 and V50s (in 2008),Citroën C2, C3 and C3 Pluriel models in 2006. Also Audi in 1987.
I also heard that Ford recalled the Focus due to fire risk in December 2009.Ford recalled 30,000 of its Focus models in the UK because of a safety problem. The engine could catch fire in these Focus cars. Up to 65,000 models could be affected in Europe, with 29,451 of them in the UK.
Ford issued the recall of 4.5 million vehicles, making it the largest single recall in history. This is even larger than the Toyota recall, which concerned 3.8 million vehicles. The reason behind the Ford recall is due to a faulty cruise control switch, this in turn could lead to a fire. I have not noticed the media going on and on about the Ford problem.
If I was going out to buy a new car tomorrow it WOULD be a Toytoa.
PS. I have no connetions to Toytoa in any way, just a happy Toyota driver and customer.