‘Vehicular incompetence’: Woman tells dad her car accelerates strangely, but when he inspects it, he realizes she’s been making a costly mistake

A woman on TikTok just found out she had been driving her Toyota in the wrong gear for two whole years. Hannah, who goes by @hanahbananaspammy on the platform, posted a video explaining what happened. She had complained to her father about her car’s rough acceleration, and he discovered the shocking truth during his inspection.

Hannah wrote in her video that she might have been “frying” her engine this entire time because of the gear mistake. This is bad news for anyone, especially since fixing cars costs a lot of money these days.When people saw Hannah’s video online, many of them were harsh. 

According to Motor1, viewers on TikTok made quick judgments about her driving skills and how much she knows about cars. Some commenters were completely confused about how this could even happen. One person asked how someone drives in the wrong gear, saying manual cars would get stuck in first gear, and automatic cars shouldn’t use manual mode at all. Another viewer said the high RPMs should have made it obvious something was wrong.

People were shocked that someone could make this kind of mistake

The criticism came fast and hard. One person said “Vehicular incompetence should genuinely be a misdemeanor.” Others questioned how easy it is to get a driver’s license nowadays. Most people seemed to agree that drivers need better education about their vehicles before getting on the road. “I feel like people should be more educated on their cars before they should drive, similar to how a pilot has to know their plane,” one user wrote. 

Hannah didn’t stay quiet after all the negative comments. She edited her caption and posted another video asking people to watch it before calling her incompetent. The term “incompetent” has been thrown around in other controversial public situations as well, showing how quickly people judge others online. She said she’s “a pretty good driver” and others have told her the same thing. She explained that her mistake was only about the gear, saying it had nothing to do with her actual driving ability.

Hannah then cleared up the confusion. Her car has an automatic transmission, not a manual one like many viewers thought. She hadn’t been using the regular Drive position. Instead, she had accidentally shifted it slightly over to the ‘4’ gear setting.

In automatic cars, drivers can choose specific gears. Lower gears work better for slow speeds or tough driving conditions. Higher gears are for highway speeds. By choosing ‘4’ instead of ‘D’, Hannah was telling her car to stop shifting after fourth gear.

After Hannah explained everything, people changed their tune. Many viewers said sorry for being too harsh. They understood it was just a simple shifter mistake, not a major lack of car knowledge. Similar cases of incompetence leading to public scrutiny have shown how quick judgment can sometimes be unfair.