Need help with 2014 Prius Three

Welcome to PC. Sorry about the accident. Hope you're OK.

Standard procedure is that you immediately call the police when someone hits you and, if they are at fault, their insurance pays for everything. This should not cost you one dime in an ideal world.

But it's not an ideal world. Still the other driver is responsible for the cost of your repairs. If they don't have insurance, then your insurance should take care of you and go after the other driver. Since you didn't call the police immediately, I don't know what will happen.

Also, if the airbag deploys, the insurance company usually totals the car.

If you're determined to get the car fixed, you'll need to read the codes to find out what all the other driver broke and what the repair shop screwed up. The repairs will likely cost more than replacing the whole car. Perhaps one of our members in the Phoenix area knows of a body shop that's Prius fluent.

 

Bummer. I'm not sure if there's any way to fake out that air bag warning, but I doubt it. And I would only want to do so for a temporary stop-gap till I could get it replaced. But that's so expensive that it's the reason insurance companies usually total a car if an air bag deploys.

The humming noise from the engine is peculiar. You'd need to get under the hood and listen, probably with a mechanic's stethoscope. Humming from the a/c pump is normal, but since you said this is new, that' different. Engine coolant pump? Inverter coolant pump?

If you get the codes read, that may point you in the right direction. Just make sure it's a reader that has the Prius PIDs and don't forget to get the sub codes.

 

Normally I'm the last person on this forum who would advise that you take the car to a dealer, but this may be an exception to the rule.

Airbags are not to be tinkered with lightly!
The reason that it's not easy to drive a car with a deployed airbag is that some people.....and I'm sure that I'm not talking about you.....would be tempted to not replace the airbag when they fix the car following a collision.
That's cool with me...........until you sell the car.
Back in the days when dinosaurs roamed the earth and cars only had one airbag, they used to sell connectors that would make the car think that there was a functioning airbag installed and extinguish the ID10t light(s). These plugs usually could be made for less than $1, which led to some unfortunate temptations.
Now that cars have lots and lots of airbags, things are a little more complicated.

Dealerships are often not as bad as I make them out to be in this forum.
Sometimes, they're run by people who are almost ethical.....whose moral compasses only start to wobble a little bit whenever the subject of money comes up. If you tell them that you're cash flowing the repair, they will often cut you a break on the price, since they know that the insurance company is not footing the bill.
There might also be an independent mechanic in the area who can replace the side curtain bag more cheaply than the bigs.

Good Luck!