Complaint 2210555

Complaint Summary

STEERING

Owner Narrative

While my granddaughter was driving our 2019 Ford Explorer, the steering effort suddenly increased without warning, as if the electric power steering assist stopped functioning. She was traveling at approximately 45 mph on a public road and was unable to steer normally. The sudden loss of assist caused her to nearly leave her lane and almost resulted in a collision. This vehicle uses an electric‑assist rack‑and‑pinion steering system. There were no warning lights or messages before or during the event. Road conditions were dry. After the incident, steering remained abnormally heavy/intermittent. It isn't as though it mimics an old school vehicle without power steering, where it simply requires a good deal of strength. With this situation, if you work hard to make a correction, the car suddenly pulls further quickly in that direction, or in the opposite direction in a very jerky manner. The failure occurred without any prior symptoms and created an immediate loss‑of‑control hazard, especially for younger or smaller drivers who cannot overcome the sudden increase in steering force. It basically feels like it is locked up. I am reporting this because the failure was sudden, unannounced, and nearly caused an accident. This appears to be a malfunction of the electric power steering assist system, and it presents an unreasonable safety risk. On a related note, I am the Director of Quality for a manufacturing facility and have conducted hundreds of formal risk assessments during product design. A sudden, unannounced loss of steering assist represents a high‑severity, low‑tolerance safety hazard. In my professional opinion, this failure mode warrants an accelerated investigation.

Owner-submitted narrative on file with NHTSA. Complaint narratives are self-reported and have not been verified.