Memorize this, in case it stops a runaway Prius
Posted on 10. Mar, 2010 by kchristieh in travel
After years of driving big cars, I was thrilled to get my 2008 Toyota Prius two years ago. It’s easy to maneuver and I love not wasting gas. When I received a recall notice last Fall asking me to take the car in because the accelerator might get stuck under the floor mat, I examined the floor mat and decided that was highly unlikely. I’ll have the dealer take care of it when I go in for my regular service.
I was hoping that the sticky accelerator problems that have been documented on 2009-10 models wouldn’t apply to mine, but the New York Times tells how two separate runaway Prius incidents don’t appear to have anything to do with floor mats:
But a man whose 2008 Prius raced along 30 miles of Interstate in California at up to 94 miles an hour before the police helped him stop it has insisted that the floor mat was not interfering.
Also, the police who responded to a crash Tuesday morning of a 2005 Prius into a stone wall in Harrison, N.Y., said the floor mat had been tied to the seat frame, presumably by a dealer.
“We can rule out the mats,” Harrison’s acting police chief, Anthony Marraccini, said.
It sounds like Toyota doesn’t know what to do about the sticking accelerator issue. Until they do, I still need my car, and will hope and pray that my car doesn’t experience any problems.
The Los Angeles Times details how the driver of the 2008 Prius got his car to stop:
Sikes said his “nerve-racking” experience ended when a CHP officer, responding to his 911 call, instructed him through a loudspeaker to apply his emergency brake in tandem with the brake pedal. Sikes pressed down, hard. “My bottom wasn’t even on the seat,” he said.
When the Prius, which had reached 90 mph, dropped to about 50 mph, Sikes turned off the engine and coasted to a stop. There was nothing else he could have done to stop the car, Sikes said.
One of the comments on the GreenCarReports.com article about the recall had a tip on how to stop a Prius if it suddenly accelerates:
I own a 2010 Prius and took it for a spin today to see if I could stop the car with my foot jammed down on the accelerator. Twice I put it in neutral with the engine roaring and each time it shifted to neutral and put the engine in idle where I could easily stop the car. Here is the trick… Just shifting to neutral didn’t do it. You have to hold the stick in the neutral position for a couple of seconds before it cuts in. Try it. It’s pretty easy and the test put my mind at ease. I’m confident that I can stop my car if this acceleration issue happens to me (whatever the cause).
The driver in yesterday’s incident didn’t want to try that:
When the accelerator stuck, he said he weighed all his options. He feared turning the car off in the middle of traffic, expecting the steering wheel to lock. If he shifted into neutral, he worried that it would slip into reverse.
Hopefully this won’t be necessary. Thank goodness I’m not trying to sell my car right now. And thank goodness I can teach my son to drive on a different car.
Summary:
Two things to try:
- Apply the emergency brakes at the same time as you press on the gas pedal. When your speed drops, turn off the engine. OR
- Hold the stick in the neutral position for a few seconds in order to get it to go to neutral.
How about hitting that peacock? It might help you slow down!
And if I travel up the mountain to hit a whole flock, it’d work even better, I suppose.
Awww, but they’re so pretty, Lisa!!! ;)
I wondered how he could be talking on his cellphone while driving 94 mph. Do you fully believe his story? If I were going that fast in a car, I don’t think I could be talking on my cellphone and I do think I would have tried putting the car in neutral. I can only speculate, of course. Who knows what one would do if it actually happened, so I shouldn’t judge. The story just sounded a little far fetched to me.