NHTSA Complaint #11526574 — 2020 MAZDA MAZDA3

I was driving down 2nd Avenue in Manhattan, traffic was crowded but flowing with an estimated speed of 20mph between lights. I believe the distance between my front bumper and the car ahead was only slightly under 2 car lengths in motion. Coming to a stop light, the car in front of me slowed and I followed, applying pressure to the brake gradually. Roughly 2-3 seconds into my braking, the forward collision warning activated (fast beep) followed by a hard brake causing myself and one passenger to lurch forward. The car behind me managed to hard brake before hitting me by a very small margin. As my car came to a near stop the space in front opened to several car lengths, that is a continuous application of gradual braking would have been totally sufficient to stop. Weather conditions were good. A similar situation had occurred to me before on the highway (unnecessary forward collision warning, but thankfully no auto brake) and so after this I decided to check the front for any obstruction of sensors and could not find any. I have heard from at least one other owner of a similar model Mazda that they have experienced the same during city/Manhattan driving.