Hyundai Elantra's alleged unintended acceleration sends teen, police on a 113-mile ride

[FFTeam]

Back in December, one North Texas teenager received a quick lesson in car control at the hands of his 2011 Hyundai Elantra. Elez Lushaj called police, after he says his car accelerated to nearly 120 mph on Highway 183 unintentionally. Dispatchers urged the 16-year-old driver to try everything from turning the car off to standing on the brakes and putting the car in neutral, but Lushaj told them nothing was working. Flummoxed, police simply did their best to warn traffic away from the speeding compact with the hope that the car would eventually run out of fuel.

Before that could happen, Lushaj lost control on Interstate 30 after some 90 minutes as he attempted to avoid a semi truck. The Elantra rolled four times, leaving the driver conscious but with several broken bones. Police commended Lushaj for keeping the car on the road and away from population centers for as long as he did.

Hyundai, meanwhile, said that it hasn't heard anything on the case. Spokesperson Jim Trainor reported to WFAA that it was "extremely unlikely for simultaneous and spontaneous total system failures for the brakes, accelerator and transmission to occur at the same time" and notes that Hyundai would like to investigate, but this is the first they've heard of Lushaj's wild ride. You can watch a local news report on the incident below for more information.Continue reading Hyundai Elantra's alleged unintended acceleration sends teen, police on a 113-mile ride

Hyundai Elantra's alleged unintended acceleration sends teen, police on a 113-mile ride originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 09:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

[Adamdv5]

I saw an interesting comment about this: how did an Elantra do 120 when it's limited to around 95?