Steering wheel and brakes stopped working

My friend was driving us to Stanley Park earlier today. Traffic was horrible in downtown Vancouver. We were stuck waiting for a light change in what looked like a traffic jam.

Her car is basically new. Bought new April 2023.

Two red warning lights showed up suddenly -- oil and battery.

For unclear reasons, her car became unresponsive.

There was a slight downward slope so she let it drift and steered it into a side street. But then noticed her brakes stopped working. This was highly concerning because we were coming up to an intersection and there seemed to be a distracted pedestrian who might have been ready to cross right in front of us.

Fortunately, she did not.

My friend managed to drift her car onto a flat street and it came to a halt. Her steering wheel stopped responding. Brakes still not responding, but the car had rolled to a halt.

We were dead in the water so to speak.

She turned the car off. Waited a minute or so then started it up again.

Warning lights were gone. Car was fine.

A number of fortunate circumstances meant no one got hurt and there was no traffic accident. We were in a bad spot (too close to a bus stop) but fortunately didn't need a tow.

We of course cancelled our plans and she managed to drive home safely.

She called the service centre. They were backlogged and couldn't handle it till Wednesday, maybe Tuesday. No they didn't have a loaner car for her -- they were all checked out.

So this freaky malfunction will cost her access to her car for several days, probably more. Hard to say if they will even find out what happened since it's apparently working fine now. But can we trust this car again?

And then there's the cost of adjusting to not having a car for those days.

With new-fangled technologies jammed into a car controlling every feature come new complications.

I don't remember my dad's 1980's Toyota Corolla ever having anything like this. And surely the brakes and steering wheel would still have worked unless those were specifically what was broken.

It was a pretty damn scary day. We got off lucky.

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Life in the Lower Mainland (BC, Canada)

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