I was driving full freeway speed when the brake assist system suddenly engaged which slammed on my brakes immediately and sent me skidding all over the freeway trying to maintain control of the vehicle and not crash into anything. All the while the cars behind me had to veer out of the way. Several accidents were almost caused by this incident. This safety feature is now a safety hazard. This should never ever happen. This I'd comparable to an airbag suddenly deploying while driving. An absolutely terrifying experience. The bas fct light came on which is how I learned of the brake assist system. This problem is repeatable because it happened 2 more times as I had to get my vehicle home but luckily I didn't date take the freeway again. Problem just started 5/7/23 without any warning at all.

- Kapolei, HI, USA

Hard braking suddenly activated without driver input, smoke coming from front wheels. YAW SENSOR malfunction indicated by OBD scanner (checked after incident)

- Portland, OR, USA

SRS. Ets. Aba lights on. Buzzing.

- Victorville, CA, USA

Sudden and complete failure of front brakes due to breakage of front steel brake lines, lost all fluid, fortunately happened in the parking lot and not during a recent trip to mass and New York city

- Greenville, PA, USA

The contact owns a 2000 Mercedes-Benz ML320. When the contact attempted to roll down both passenger side windows, they failed to roll down. The headlights and instrument panel lights failed to illuminate. The ABS, brake failure switch, and esp warning lights illuminated. When using the power steering to attempt to turn the vehicle, the warning light illuminated, indicating a malfunction of the power steering. The vehicle hesitated before completing the turn. The vehicle was not diagnosed nor repaired. The approximate failure mileage was 200,000.

- Stagecoach, NV, USA

Was driving truck at highway, when brakes activated by itself, ABS, traction light, brake lamp and hazards flashed. Had to immediately move to side of road, while brakes where activating. Felt as if ABS was activating as if I was sliding on and icy road. Had to have vehicle towed as I was not able to move more that 5 feet

- Shakopee, MN, USA

The contact owns a 2000 Mercedes Benz ML320. While the vehicle was being test driven by an independent mechanic, the brakes failed without warning. It was diagnosed that the brake line was rusted and failed. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 150,000.

- Paradise, CA, USA

Brake line rusted and brakes failed completely suddenly when my mechanic was moving auto from his garage after servicing my transmission I probably would have been in a serious accident had I picked up my car without that happening to him never expected a brake line to rust and cause brakes to suddenly be gone I am so worried another car will cause deaths if this defect is not known to owner

- Paradise, CA, USA

I have experienced multiple incidents of a situation where the ABS, esp, and ets lights come on and a noise occurs when depressing the gas pedal at low speeds. The noise stops only when the brake pedal is depressed or at speeds over 40 mph. There is also a vibration that occurs that can be felt by depressing the brake pedal. The noise continues as soon as the brake pedal is released. The car becomes difficult to drive. Turning the car off and on again does not clear the problem. When the car is turned off, a noise can be heard coming from under the hood that sounds like a motor or a fan that is running. This continues for hours. The hood of the car becomes warm to hot to the touch. At some point the fan or motor stops running. If the car battery has not been drained, the car functions normally--until the next time that the problem occurs. After a quick internet search, I found many similar reports of these symptoms by other owners of this make and model vehicle of the same or similar year of manufacture. The vehicle owners have received diagnoses of a bad ABS control module, a bad ABS pump, bad solder joints on the ABS pump assembly's circuit board, or bad relays in the fuse box. Repairs have cost in the thousands of dollars for what is apparently, a known defect. Drivers of these vehicles have been subjected to frightening incidents where their safety has been compromised by their vehicles. I realize that the law governs safety defects in cars manufactured within the last 10 years. However, people with older cars need recourse for known defects. A Mercedes such as mine, that only has only a little over 100K miles and that has been well maintained, has a life expectancy of at least another 50K to 100K miles. However, they should be safe miles.

- Piermont, NY, USA

Vehicle automatically switches off its anti-lock-brake and electronic-stability-control systems for unknown reason, thereby endangering its driver and passengers, as well as other vehicle's drivers and passengers, every time it's driven.

- Lake Forest, CA, USA

I was on the freeway, I was using my cruise control (luckily just after heavy traffic hours) just like any other day. A car slowed in front of me, so I went to apply my brakes. As soon as I hit the brake pedal the brakes not only did not disengage the cruise control but the brakes got stiff and would not work no matter how hard I pressed them. At the same time the accelerator was floored and the car was trying to go what seems like 130-140 mph. It took all my strength to try and keep it at an appropriate speed. Luckily my passenger told me to stay calm and tried to help me disengage the cruise control. I had to maneuver the car to the slowest lane and shift it into neutral. That was the only option I had besides crashing into the car in front of me. I am extremely shaken from this event, I have anxiety/panic attacks whenever I drive any vehicle now. I am currently looking for a physician to help me work out some kind of treatment/therapy.

- Loomis, CA, USA

Driving on interstate 295 in jacksonville fl at approximately 70 mph in the middle lane and the brakes locked up for 5-10 seconds and the bas/esp light came on. I nearly lost control of the vehicle and accidentally cut off several cars in the lane to my right. Fortunately nobody was injured, but it could have been very dangerous! after stopping, and shutting the car off, at an exit for so I could see if I could spot anything I tried to make my way home (off the interstate). The bas/esp light was off, and everything seemed to be alright. However, after about 30 minutes, the brakes locked up again. I was only going about 30 mph, but I was forced to come to a complete stop. There was a car behind me, but they were able to get around me safely.

- Jacksonville, FL, USA

The vehicle brakes, within a five second period, violently engage at seeming random patterns and bring the vehicle to a complete stop. This is happened twice on two different days roughly a month apart, and only twice, in the same location at exactly the same driving conditions (vehicle speed, weather - sunny day no rain, straight road, light traffic, same 25-30 mph speed). I went to the Mercedes dealer in tysons corner and they said they did not know of a recall for this issue. The interesting thing about the location is that it is in within 50M of high capacity power lines which go over the road, and within 300M of an extremely powerful radio antenna tructure tower. I believe the electronics of one or both of these are causing the car's electronic stablility control /brake assist computer to go haywire and cause a complete loss of vehicle control. The location is on route 29 lee highway, va right before the bridge that crosses over the beltway going westbound, just past where you cross under the power lines that go overhead. The radio tower is on the other side of this bridge. 95% of the time I drove this exact route over the past several years this problem does not happen, so it is an intermittent issue. Turning the engine off twice seems to reset the system and it seems to work fine. Also note that these powerlines, without fail, also cause the same car's alarm to go off 100% of the time when I park within 100M of them. The dealer did acknowledge that this make/model/year can have a spontaneous car alarm issue. Hopefully this will help solve the problem of electrical interference with the cars braking safety computer and prevent a serious accident in the future for someone else. It would useful for your staff to use a geographic information system to map the similar incidents. I suspect they are all near electrical or radio interference as well.

- Falls Church, VA, USA

While driving on a highway at about 55-58 mph for no reason brakes engaged and locked wheels. Smoke was coming out of the tires and esp light came on. My wife (she was driving) and two small kids as well as I were scared to death. We were lucky, nobody was right behind us and we avoided accident. After the esp light come on everything went to normal. We finished our trip with no more brake incidents. Next day after restarting the car light was off but brakes locked in the moment RPM went over 1000. Speed at that time was only 5-10 mph. After complete stop esp light came on again and I was able to continue my trip. None of the Mercedes Benz mechanics wanted to tell me what this was caused by. I continued to drive like that for the next year. Every time I would drive without the esp light on the brakes will lock in and bring the car to complete stop. I also learn that if I start the car and wait five minutes light will come on and I can ride without brakes locking in. This worked for a while but then esp light stopped coming on before driving and I had to wait for the brakes to engage and cause the light to come on. At that time on April 2011 I had the car tested at the Mercedes dealership and was told that has faulty yaw rate sensor and the part cost is about $550 not counting labor. I didn't have this replaced because the cost of it and because I believe this is a safety issue and Mercedes Benz should have a recall on this as soon as possible to avoid tragedy one day. Someday somebody will die in the car accident caused by this faulty yaw rate sensor and nobody will even know what led to this crush. Please have this checked quickly before somebody will get hurt and who knows maybe somebody already did die already and we don't know about it. There were a lot of identical incidents reported. It is dangerous behavior on Mercedes Benz part. Regards, ML320 user

- Garland, NC, USA

While driving around 50mph on the bqe road (NY), suddenly the bas/esp light came on, all the brakes engaged and car was coming to a stop. Warning light on a dashboard was flashing and at first I thought the engine died. Not realizing what is happening, I tried to add power/gas to the car, but the engine didn't want to go past 1000 RPM. Being in a fast lane and having hard time controlling the movement of the car, I"?ve noticed overpowering smell of the brakes. I was absolutely shocked by the event as the traffic was heavy and I was just hoping no one will rear me. Stepping on the gas pedal had almost no result even though the motor was running. It then started to accelerate very slowly when my foot was pressing the gas pedal all the way to the floor of the car. Some 5-10 minutes later, the car started to accelerate and behaving as nothing has happened. However, 15 minutes into the ride, the same thing happened and this time, I was driving in a slow lane - some 30-35 mph. I pulled over and let the car rest for about 5 minutes and it stared fine and drove fine for the rest of the evening. Once I parked the car, the bas esp light was still on and stayed on. I took the car very next day to a car mechanic, but the computer reading didn?"T give any errors, faults nor notifications. By that time, the esp light was off once again. The incident recurred 3 days later while coming to a stop due to a traffic lights - some 15-20 mph. My mechanic (and my internet search) advised me to change the yaw sensor. I fully understand the sensor can become faulty, but fully engaging the brakes while traveling is extremely dangerous. I'm now waiting for the yaw sensor to be replaced.

- Astoria, NY, USA

At highway speed car jerked violently to the left as off the from right brake was being applied on its own. Turned the esp (electronic stability control) off and proceeded and the event happened again, car jerked to left and headed to ditch but was able to overcome with steering wheel. It appears a car system failed crash rather than fail safe.

- Stuart, FL, USA