NHTSA Complaint #11446264 — 2021 AUDI Q5 E

While driving in the far left of the 405N in Long Beach, the vehicle experienced some catastrophic failure. The accelerator stopped working, gear shifting was not possible, the interior lights turned on and flashed, there was some text instruction on the screen about the vehicle having lost power, and the emergency On-Star system was not available. There were no warnings, messages or other symptoms prior to the malfunction of the vehicle. We managed to coast across 4 lanes of traffic moving at a high freeway speed, with our hazard lights flashing and honking to get other drivers' attention, and made it to the right shoulder before using the brakes to stop the car. Upon stopping, all four windows automatically rolled down slightly. It was not possible to restart the vehicle, change the gear, put the car in neutral or operate any of the electrical systems in the car, including On-Star. We were fortunate, but still very much in danger, to have stopped at a small triangular shoulder between the 405 freeway and an adjacent on-ramp. Cars were passing us at full speed and in close proximity on both sides of the car. We called AAA as well as 911 to assist us in getting out of that harrowing situation safely. The vehicle was towed directly to the Audi Service Center in Santa Monica, where we left it with an after-hours note describing the issue we experienced. We called Audi the following morning and the service tech, Angel, said they would review the problem. Upon review, Angel confirmed that the issue was a failure in the gateway control module - a problem that Audi is aware of and has occurred in many of the same types of vehicles. We found through online searches of this issue that it is generally caused by water spilled in the backseat of the vehicle. Angel confirmed that no moisture was found inside the vehicle and he did not believe the failure was caused by spilled liquid. Audi is now insisting that we continue to drive the car, without the issue being fixed.