- The Ford Mustang Mach-E doesn’t have an external manual door handle. It uses a button instead to activate a motor that pops the door open.
- A Mach-E owner told InsideEVs that this system abruptly failed one day, trapping his 9-month-old infant inside for 40 minutes.
- Even Ford’s own roadside assistance couldn’t open the door without having it towed to the dealership.
The Ford Mustang Mach-E was the best-driving car Malcolm Gordon ever owned. Packed with technology he loved, it used to be his favorite car. But that changed last Friday when the Mach-E’s electronic doors failed to open, trapping his 9-month-old baby inside for nearly an hour. Now, Gordon said he can’t wait to part with his EV—for good.
Gordon, who lives in Los Angeles, was at work last Friday when his cell rang. His wife had parked the Mach-E at a curbside charging station in San Fernando Valley, with temperatures rising to a balmy 80 degrees Fahrenheit. She was there to pick up their older son from winter camp, along with their younger son strapped in the rear seat.
The moment she stepped out of the Mach-E, it went completely dead. A brick on wheels, with their baby locked inside.
“Between the time of her getting out of the car and walking to the rear seat to grab our baby, the car became completely disabled,” Gordon told InsideEVs. “If this had happened during a hotter season, my son may not be alive right now.”
The Mach-E was the second best-selling electric SUV in the U.S. last year after the Tesla Model Y, with Ford delivering nearly 52,000 examples. Like many modern EVs, it’s built in novel ways; the Mach-E ditches the external manual door handle for a tiny round button on the B-pillar that activates a motor that pops the door open.
Ford Mustang Mach-E Door Handles
Then, you pull the blacked-out horizontal grab handle near the bottom of the window to open the door. It can be unlocked with the key fob, the FordPass app, or by typing the password on Ford’s traditional digital keypad on the door.
Yet none of these unlocking methods worked, Gordon said. He dashed to the spot from work and dialed AAA emergency roadside assistance. “They brought the tools to get through the door but couldn’t reach the latch within the door panel,” Gordon said. Ford’s roadside assistance also arrived, but they couldn’t help either. Left with no other option, Gordon smashed the front right window and the baby escaped unharmed.
A Ford spokesperson told InsideEVs that it was in touch with the customer and was aware of the incident. They said an investigation was underway, but didn’t provide further details.
A traditional 12-volt auxiliary battery, like you’d find in any gas-powered car, powers the electronic doors. Smaller functions with a lower power demand use the auxiliary pack—instead of the high-voltage one—for things such as audio, lights and power windows. When the 12-volt battery dies, the vehicle is essentially bricked. That’s exactly what happened with Gordon. When Ford’s roadside assistance arrived, they couldn’t jump-start the auxiliary battery. It had a fail-safe mechanism, but even that failed, Gordon said.
The Mach-E’s front bumper houses cables owners can hook up to their booster pack to open the frunk. Owners can then jump-start the 12-volt pack to power the car’s key functions. This didn’t work because “the battery was in a kind of goldilocks zone,” Gordon said.
It had some charge left, but not enough to power any vehicle functions and it wasn’t completely dead to be jump-started—which means the frunk wouldn’t open. Smashing the window was the only option.
The auto industry embraced electronic vehicle functions long before EVs started becoming popular. Powered mirrors, seats and tailgates are a few examples of this.
EVs are taking this to a whole new level. Many automakers are working on new approaches to things like door handles in order to increase aerodynamics to boost range and cut production costs. That’s especially true of the new crop of software-defined vehicles, where critical functions previously hand-operated are now computerized. There are other benefits as well: Automakers told Consumer Reports last year that electronic doors help add safety features, like automatic unlocking during a crash or preventing doors from opening into the paths of approaching vehicles or cyclists.
But these can present new problems too. A gear shifter lever might be replaced with knobs or buttons, for example; powered charging port covers can also fail to open.
While they do have the option of an emergency manual override from the inside, finding and operating these emergency releases can be difficult—especially in a panic situation. Things get trickier with toddlers or pets inside, where you can’t instruct them. Moreover, each carmaker positions their manual door release in a different spot or has specific instructions buried in their user manuals, which most owners likely don’t read. InsideEVs has a detailed explainer on what to do when you’re stuck inside a vehicle.
Several EVs, including all Teslas, Lucid Air, BMW iX and the Audi e-tron range, have motor-activated doors. Getting locked in is as much of a problem as getting locked out. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has received several complaints about EV owners getting locked out of their vehicles due to electronic doors. And owners have also taken to online forums about flush door handles not popping out or becoming unresponsive.
Photo by: Ford
Ford Mustang Mach-E Rear Doors
This complexity has led to several incidents over the years—many of them fatal—as passengers got trapped in their vehicles and couldn’t find the manual door release. In 2022, a Tesla Model Y driver said his EV’s doors got jammed after it caught fire in Vancouver, forcing him to break the windshield to get out. In October, a fiery crash killed four out of five Tesla occupants in Toronto after witnesses said they were unable to open the doors to rescue the passengers.
After rescuing their baby, Gordon got his Mach-E towed to the Sunrise Ford dealership in North Hollywood. Dealership officials said the warranty wouldn’t cover the damages—totaling about $2,000, including the broken window and the new 12-volt battery.
Gordon then shared his experience on Threads the following day. Then, “some higher-ups at Ford reached out to me and offered to pay for the window, the battery and the rental car,” he said. He also proposed a buyback to Ford but is unsure if that would work out.
“I don’t feel safe in that car with a 9-month-old. It’s not safe for my family,” he said. “Now I’ll make sure that whatever I buy going forward will have mechanical locks, so I can get into the car within seconds if I had to.”
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