NHTSA Complaint #11504271 — 2022 SUBARU OUTBACK

On January 28, 2023 at approximately 1930 hours, vehicle battery was dead after being in a parking garage for a week. Vehicle was jump started and being driven on a highway for about 10 miles at highway speeds. At a location on the NYC Harlem River Drive, traffic came to a stop for a minute or so. The 'Auto Start Stop System' stopped the motor as designed. When traffic started to move again, the motor would not restart and the battery was dead. We were disabled in the left lane of an unlit high speed, high volume highway in the dark with our emergency flashers rapidly going dim. After about 45 minutes and numerous near serious collision misses, a tow truck arrived to tow us off of the highway. The system that failed was the 'Auto Start Stop System' and the vehicle is available for inspection. I have 40 years of investigating and reconstructing fatal and serious motor vehicle collisions and this defect put the safety of the motoring public at a serious risk. It is unknown if the problem has been reproduced and the component has not been inspected by the manufacturer. There was not any warning indicators or other symptoms of the problem. To the contrary, the vehicle operator had the false assumption that all systems were operating properly. This defect presents a high risk of serious injury to highway users.