Actor Anton Yelchin was killed in a freak accident this past Sunday. On first reading it sounded like Darwin claimed another dumass. But now information is coming out that the transmission UI [caranddriver.com] may be the culprit.
Other owners have reported rollaways in which the vehicle indicated it had engaged park when it was actually in neutral. One of these reported instances involved a Cherokee that went into a lake, having first rolled over someone’s foot and dragged the person into “eight to 10 feet of water
Lester Holt [nbcnews.com] says the UI may be at fault, with Chrysler releasing videos on how to properly use the transmission.
Subby has been driving for over 40 years, starting with a manual transmission and 10 years ago going automatic. The only automatic training I had was the "put it in P when you park, D when you drive, and R when you want to back up". Lester's video made it look like operating the transmission was like operating my 1 year old car stereo. I can change the volume and radio station, but for anything else I need to pull over, press buttons, and read the display to see what's going on.