GREENSBORO, N.C. — It was by all accounts a typical day. The weather was nice, and the roads were busy, but not crowded, as many people were on their way to work.
One of those people was a viewer of ours who did not want to be identified. You’ll understand more about why in a little bit.
Our viewer was in his brand-new GMC Sierra truck hauling some heavy equipment on a flatbed trailer. What he didn’t realize was that in a couple of minutes, he would be involved in what could have been a nasty crash.
'The brakes didn't work'
While driving to a job site, he says another driver pulled out in front of him.
“A lady shot out in front of me, and I hit the brakes,” the truck owner said.
He quickly discovered the truck was not stopping fast enough. The truck brakes work, but the brakes on the trailer didn't. He promptly swerved off the road to avoid an accident.
“The brakes didn’t work. This about caused an accident and it could have been really bad,” the truck owner said.
Not long after that, the truck owner called the dealership where he bought the truck. He informed them of what took place and explained the problem. He also reached out to News 2 to share his story in hopes of getting the word out.
We immediately contacted that dealership and another local General Motors (GM) dealer. The dealership where the owner bought the truck did not want to speak with us and the owner did not return our calls. The other dealership did talk with us, and one of the managers decided to check his fleet of GMC Sierra trucks.
'I am surprised there is not a recall'
A couple of days later, the manager informed us that one of his trucks had the same braking issue.
“We checked the trucks on our lot, and one had a problem,” the manager said.
He considered the problem concerning enough that he put a stop sale on the truck. He then shared a bulletin with us that General Motors sent out in late 2022, but said he didn’t realize the potential danger.
We asked about a recall or some sort of alert, curious if GM sent out anything else to dealers or customers about the braking issue. We were told the manager only received a bulletin. He described it as something dealerships receive all the time about tons of items that are usually not serious or dangerous issues.
“I am surprised there is not a recall,” the manager said.
A few days after our calls, a representative with GM got back to us. After explaining the situation, he said the car company would investigate the issue and get back to us. We were also told GM would reach out to the customer to better understand the problem.
A few days passed and the representative emailed us back letting us know GM was in contact with the truck owner and that a team of investigators was working to understand what was going on.
What's being done?
Concerned about the potential safety issue, we asked GM if it was considering a recall, an alert to be sent to owners, or a notice to be sent to dealers about the issue.
The company assured us it was doing everything it could to understand the issue and sent us this statement:
“GM takes these types of issues very seriously and we are currently looking into this situation," the statement read.
At this time, it is unclear how many of these trucks have a braking issue when a trailer is connected. GM would not provide us with many details and we can only confirm that two trucks have the problem. The manager we spoke with certainly believes there are many more, which is part of the reason he agreed to speak with us.
"I'm concerned enough, I want more information before I put any (on the road)," the manager said.
As for the owner who reached out to us, GM agreed to buy back his truck and give him a full refund.
Prior to our story airing, we again reached out to GM to see if it had any updates or would answer some additional questions, but the representative politely declined and referred us back to the initial statement.