After Koenigsegg ordered every Jesko owner off the road this week as a result of a fire in one of its cars, Toyota might be quaking in its boots as a GR Corolla has been filmed going up in smoke on the highway. Nobody was injured in the blaze, but a dashcam running through the disaster caught the exact moment the driver’s heart broke.
The GR Corolla has been a big hit for Toyota since it launched, selling out rapidly and commanding sky-high markups from dealers fortunate enough to have stock remaining. However, one driver’s love affair with their GRolla came to an abrupt end this month when it caught fire, reports CarScoops.
The drive took their Corolla out into the North Carolina heat earlier this month with a dash cam trained on them in the driver’s seat and their hood up front.
While they drove along at a steady 80 mph, the driver noticed a loss in power and pulled the car over to the side of the road. They then popped out front and lifted the hood of the Corolla to see what the problem could be. It’s at this moment that flames started erupting from the engine bay, as you can see in the video below through the little gap beneath the open hood.
Within a few seconds, the bright orange flames rose higher and higher, before they engulfed the entire engine bay of the beloved car. The hood then slammed shut and the smoke continued billowing out. As the fire consumed the whole front end of the car, there were loud bangs as the tires in the Corolla blew out and debris from the burning hood floated skyward.
The cause of the blaze hasn’t yet been determined, but CarScoops has a few theories about what might be to blame:
“So far the dealer’s suspicion is that excess fuel from a potential fault was bypassing the cylinder and combusting in the turbo. That’s pure speculation right now but it makes the most sense and would mean it’s highly likely this is a one of one issue,” he says in the comment section of the video.
YouTuber Wolf and Tiger, who posted the footage online, took to the comments section of the video to explain that they’re waiting to hear back from Toyota as to what could have caused the blaze in their GR Corolla.
However, it wasn’t the first Toyota fire to happen this month, with CarScoops adding that a member of a GRolla owners group on Facebook said their hot hatch had also gone up in smoke. Their fire appears unrelated, though, as it came after they were rear-ended by another driver.