How to Escape Your Car If the Electronic Door Handle Fails
Learn how to operate the emergency release
Doors that require some extra effort to open when a vehicle loses power are becoming more common. Many new vehicles have exterior door handles that sit flush until the use of a key fob or other device prompts them to emerge from the side of the vehicle.
Some vehicles have electronic interior handles as well. Instead of grabbing onto a manual lever to open the car door from the inside, drivers and passengers now must depress an electronic button, or “electric door” handle or release, that signals an electric motor to unlatch it.
@consumerreports Keith Barry, autos reporter at CR, shares why drivers of some modern vehicles should learn where emergency door releases are located—before they need them. #cartok #carsoftiktok #cartips ♬ original sound - Consumer Reports
In 2022, the owner of a Tesla Model Y that caught fire in North Vancouver, B.C., told a local CTV News station that its electrically operated doors wouldn’t open, trapping him inside. He said that in his panic, he couldn’t figure out how to operate the emergency interior door release and kicked through the window to escape. And in 2018, the 75-year-old owner of a 2006 Cadillac XLR was trapped inside of his vehicle for 14 hours after its battery died, leaving the electronic door releases inoperable. He could have immediately released himself had he known the location of the manual door release.
“While it’s rare, in certain types of car crashes, the interior electronic door latch may not operate. So if you have a car without a conventional handle, you need to learn how to operate the emergency release,” says Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing at Consumer Reports. “Automakers should make it easy and obvious how to exit the vehicle in an emergency, but unfortunately that’s not always the case. Your owner’s manual will tell you where to find the mechanical lever and how to use it. Give it a try. An actual emergency is not the time to figure it out.”
Photo: Tesla Photo: Tesla
How to Manually Open Electronic Doors From the Inside
In addition to all of Tesla’s models, vehicles including the Audi E-Tron, Chevrolet Corvette, Ford Mustang Mach-E, Genesis G90, Lexus NX, Lucid Air, and the discontinued Lincoln Continental also make use of electronic interior door releases. All of these also have some sort of manual release mechanism that may not be immediately apparent.
For example, the driver of the Tesla that caught fire in Vancouver could have used a manual door release lever located immediately in front of the electronic door release button. The image below from a Tesla Model Y owner’s manual shows where the manual door release lever is located and how to use it.
Photo: John Powers/Consumer Reports Photo: John Powers/Consumer Reports
- The owner’s manual for the Audi E-Tron says its doors can be opened mechanically by pulling the handle “forcefully” and “beyond its noticeable resistance” twice.
- For BMW vehicles, a manual door release is located below the unlock button, near the storage pocket.
- In the Chevrolet Corvette and the discontinued Cadillac XLR, both from General Motors, the emergency door releases are on the floor between the doors and the sills of the car. Pull up the lever and the door will open. “If an owner is having an issue with their electronic door latches, they should consult their local Chevrolet dealer,” a spokesperson told CR.
- In the Ford Mustang Mach-E, there’s a manual door release inside the door armrest. Pull it back and the door will open.
- In the Genesis G90, pull the emergency open lever under the door pocket twice to open the door.
- The Lexus Digital Latch can be overridden by pulling the door lever toward you twice instead of pushing it once. A Lexus spokesperson told CR that all four doors have an override.
- The Lincoln Continental has an emergency door release lever at the front of the storage pocket at the bottom of the door.
- Lucid says to pull the interior handle even further to release the door manually. This may take some effort.
- Maserati has an emergency release handle inside the front door pocket, below the door handle.
What About Rear Passengers?
All modern cars have child safety door locks that, when activated, prevent the rear doors from being opened from inside the vehicle. They’re designed to keep kids from opening the rear doors, but the safety feature can lead to rear-seat occupants being unable to open the doors in an emergency. (Your car’s owner’s manual will tell you how to disengage these locks if you want occupants to be able to open the rear doors from inside the vehicle. They’re usually engaged and disengaged via a toggle in a slot on the inside of the car door or doorjamb.)
According to the safety advocacy group Kids and Cars, if the rear doors don’t open from inside the car, rear-seat passengers should use the front doors to exit a vehicle in an emergency. If that’s not possible, they should turn on the vehicle’s hazard lights, honk the horn, or otherwise try to make themselves visible to passers-by.
Some vehicles with electronic interior door releases—including the Tesla Model Y and Model 3—don’t have a manual rear door release. Others have more complex ones. In a Tesla Model X with nonfunctioning powered rear “falcon” doors, you must first remove a speaker grille before pulling on a release cable.
Do You Need a Hammer?
Many auto supply stores sell spring-loaded “escape tools” that can smash a car’s window from inside to give occupants another way of exiting in an emergency.
But beware: Another wrinkle of modern technology may render some of these tools useless. Strong, laminated glass can keep occupants from being ejected from a vehicle in a crash and can also make for a quieter interior, but laminated glass is harder to break than traditional tempered glass.
In 2019, AAA tested six escape tools on vehicles with laminated glass and found none of them were able to break it. The group recommends looking at the labels printed on the corners of the glass on your car’s windows, sunroof, and windshield to determine what kind they’re made of. If your car has a tempered glass panel, remember where it is; in an emergency, tempered glass should be the easiest to break.
How to Manually Open Flush Exterior Door Handles
All vehicles with flush exterior door handles have some backup method of opening the vehicle, usually by pressing on the door handle while touching the key fob to a specific place on the vehicle.
Some vehicles, such as the Range Rover Velar, have a manual key inside the key fob that can unlock the vehicle. If you press on the flush door handle manually, one side of it can flip out to reveal a lock where the owner can insert the manual key.
Many vehicles also have specific instructions for what to do if the door handles freeze over when sitting flush. The specifics differ from vehicle to vehicle, but Tesla recommends using the vehicle’s phone app to force the door handles to present themselves. If that doesn’t work, it has a complex series of instructions about where to “forcefully bump” the door handle with your fist. The instructions differ based on the color of the handle.
But these methods are not immediately obvious or simple to use, so you should learn how to operate them before you end up locked out with a dead battery or in another kind of emergency. Be prepared. The Genesis G90 devotes 40 pages of its owner’s manual to various methods of unlocking the doors from the outside.
Another reason to study up ahead of time: Some of these cars also have electronic releases on their glove boxes, making printed owner’s manuals impossible to access if they get locked inside. Others have virtual owner’s manuals that may not be accessible if you’re parked somewhere without a phone or internet connection, or a key card that you’ll want to store in your wallet or purse.
Many vehicles with flush exterior door handles also have phone-based keys or remote lock/unlock functions that can be used if you lock yourself out of the vehicle. Familiarize yourself with them before you have to use them.
