Ford Escape hybrid: The car was driven on the freeway at 68 miles per hour speed, with three passengers, and suddenly a "click sound" been heard and the steering was "locked". when the steering got locked (un-movable), the breaks were hard to push, and applied. But luckily emergency lights been put on, and the vehicle breaks were press hard, and the vehicle was parked in the emergency lane on the freeway. After that, the steering was locked down and never moved. Took the car to mechanic and they referred to Ford, since they have re-call on the similar issue. Ford declined any recall, and quoted for $3200 to fix the car. This part is not available from any other manufacture besides Ford itself. The failure could have caused a deadly accident, taking everyone lives who were sitting in the car as well as other vehicles on the road.

- Fremont, CA, USA

I pulled out of a parking lot driving our new 2005 Ford Escape hybrid and approached the first intersection when a message flashed on the dash "pull over safely now." Before I could pull over the engine turned off. After a few tries, I was able to move the car on the battery power through the intersection (very slowly) to a busy bus stop. I couldn't start the car again right away. However, on battery power again, I was able to get back to the parking lot. We had the car towed to a Ford dealership from there. It took them two weeks to figure out what was wrong and fix the car. When the incident happend, the car had 260 miles on it.

- Palo Alto, CA, USA