Emergency Exit

This has always bugged me. Don't cars with trunks have a big, easy-to-see, glow-in-the-dark T-handle for releasing trunk? With the Prius it's a small, recessed metal tab, difficult to see in the dark, and below the top floor, so you have to lift that up and out of the way, in cramped quarters (without kneeling on it). And then pry off a little cover.

I've never tried our btw, maybe should. If my posts-per-hour rates falls off, you'll know what happened.

 

if i'm sinking in the river, i'll probably go the broken glass route. don't the prius doors unlock manually?

 

Yeah we have one of those combo emergency and light and glass hammer dealies, in the centre console.

All the doors are mechanical though, aren't they? Maybe hard to push open with water pressure?

 

definitely, same with the hatch.

 

you have to wait for the pressure to equalize by letting the car fill with water and breathing up near the ceiling.
not panicking is the hard part.

i guess you could disconnect the 12v and try the door lock mech.

 

But when you operate them there is no noise from an actuator, like when you operate the central locking - yet they do unlock the doors. I haven't tried with the power disconnected but I would expect they would work.

Not sure what is typical on cars sold in North America, but on "sedans" sold in Europe there are often large handles or brightly-coloured straps in the "trunk" - but in my experience these are to unlock the seats (so they can be folded down), not open the trunk to the outside world.

 

I have done this to get at a dead 12-volt battery. It is very slow, frustrating, and annoying. And that's with the car out of the water. Once you get at it you have to reach all around and try to figure which bit is the handle, and then you have to work it through all the possible ways it might move until you find one.

If it happened to me, I would expect to be fully settled onto the bottom of the lake long before I got the hatch opened.