On a mid-July morning, Doug Landry pulled into the passing lane in his 2009 Toyota Avalon. He passed a car at 90 kilometres an hour, then took his foot off the gas when the speedometer hit 110.
The car sped up, racing along Highway 11 north of Huntsville, Ont. When it hit 155 kilometres an hour, Mr. Landry said, he put both his feet on the brake pedal and all but stood on the brakes to try to slow down.
"You've got two feet on the brake and the car's not screeching to a halt," he recalled. "It's going as if there's a ghost in the car. It was as if I had somebody with their foot on the gas."
This is sudden, unintended acceleration and it lies at the heart of a serious and growing crisis for Toyota Motor Corp. (TM-N71.78-1.71-2.33%) in the face of two massive recalls of its best-selling North American vehicles.
Toyota, now the world's largest auto maker, has begun repairing potentially sticky accelerator pedals in some 2.3 million vehicles by inserting a tiny piece of steel. An earlier recall, made in November and expanded last month so that it now covers about 4.8 million vehicles – including Mr. Landry's Avalon –affects cars with floor mats that might cause a gas pedal to stay depressed. read more
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