Hello people; I am new here, just introduced myself on the new member section. I had a really horrible incident happen to me while in my 2009 Elantra GL with Sport Package auto transmission. First off, a little history. I'm from the Toronto, Ontario, Canada area. I purchased the vehicle brand new from Don Valley North Hyundai which is located in Markham, Ontario(Canada). The vehicle has never been in any kind of collision, flood or fire. My car doesn't have any aftermarket add ons whatsoever...no alarms, remote starters or stereo systems. On the morning of April 30, 2015(Thursday) I pulled into my local bank and parked into a space .I was the sole occupant in the car. I brought the vehicle to a complete stop. I placed the transmission into "Park", then removed my seat belt. After my seat belt was removed I placed my left hand on the drivers door handle, then with my right hand proceeded to turn the ignition key off. As soon as I turned the ignition key back to the off position, both the driver's and passenger front airbags deployed or went off. I was completely stunned by the implosion of the airbags, it was like a hand grenade going off on your lap.
The cabin immediately filled with a light powder or smoke, and there was a strange smell, like burnt plastic. I did not crash into any thing nor did any other car hit me. I was not injured in the incident, my ears were ringing for several hours after, but I did not receive any injuries like a broken nose or black eye or powder burns. The police did not want to attend the incident as there wasn't a collision,fire, injuries, or damage to public property. The car was towed to my local Hyundai dealer, Stouffville Hyundai. The car sat there for 5 weeks, as they wanted there engineers to inspect it, also an inspector from Transport Canada also came to inspect the car. I retained a lawyer about 3 weeks after the incident, after I saw the lack of co-operation and support from Hyundai Canada. So here we are almost 11 months after the incident. Here's where I stand: Hyundai concluded their investigation and found the SRS system in my vehicle to be working properly at the time, and that the vehicle's computer received a signal to deploy both air bags because a crash had been detected. Transport Canada has not contacted me as they are a government run organization and are not obligated to inform me of their findings. I'm waiting in limbo...as my lawyer is have'nt nothing but delay after delay from Hyundai Canada. I posted my story with photos of my car minutes after the incident happening on "CarComplaints.com" in the Elantra 2009 section seat belts and air bags. I posted here to see if anyone has ever heard of this kind of problem with other Hyundai's or any vehicle ? My vehicle was very well maintained and serviced only at the Hyundai dealer. They didn't want to touch the car, and said it was entirely Hyundai's investigation and Transport Canada. I will mention one more thing: April 2014, my car showed a "EPS" light on the dash. Electronic Power Steering fault. I went to the dealer, I was out of warranty. They told me there was nothing they could do with Good Will Warranty, and it would cost somewhere around $3-$4 thousand dollars to repair., as every part of the steering had to be replaced, but they said car was safe to drive. I fought tooth and nail with them, and finally after 4 months they agreed to do a goodwill repair...I pay for labour of 3 hours and they pay for parts. I thought it was very fair. Then several months later the EPS issue became a nation wide recall. I demanded to be reimbursed for the money it cost me to repair the car and have an alignment done. Hyundai did reimburse me, after 5 weeks of nagging. So my next question: Is it possible, when the Hyundai technicians made the repair to my Electronic Power Steering System, could they have messed up something with the Airbag sensors or modules ? Why would the passenger side airbag deploy when there was no one on that seat ? I'm only extremely grateful that this didn't happen a half hour prior to when it did, as I was driving my 3 year old daughter to day care. If those bags had of deployed when I was travelling at 80 km/h or 50 mph I surely would have lost control of the car and both my daughter and I could have been seriously injured or killed. My apologies to everyone here for such a long post; I just want as many people to hear this as possible. It's still in the hands of my lawyer and Hyundai Auto Canada. I'm trying to upload the pictures of the car but having some problems, will try again as soon as I can.
Thanks everyone for reading, much appreciated.

Joe

 

WOW! That just scary. Anything is possible but I highly doubt you'll be able to prove it was something they did to the car. I think this is just an unfortunate accident. However, I do believe Hyundai should compensate you for the damage and replacing the airbags. Hope the lawyer you have is a good one. Best of luck.