2004 FORD ESCAPE — Complaint #1792574
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about FUEL SYSTEM, GASOLINE:STORAGE:TANK ASSEMBLY filed February 4, 2022
NHTSA complaint #1792574 (ODI reference 11450444) concerns a 2004 FORD ESCAPE and was filed on February 4, 2022. The owner reports the failure occurred on February 1, 2022. The vehicle had 160,000 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to Maryland based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as fuel system, gasoline:storage:tank assembly, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.
The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.
Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same FORD ESCAPE cohort independently describe similar fuel system, gasoline:storage:tank assembly failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2004 FORD ESCAPE shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
The contact owns a 2004 Ford Escape. The contact stated while driving 45 MPH, he heard an abnormal noise coming from the rear of the vehicle and started to smell fuel in the vehicle. The contact stated no warning light was illuminated. The contact was able to park on the side of the road and noticed the fuel tank straps were corroded and had caused the fuel tank to detach from the vehicle. The contact stated he manually taped the fuel tank straps and drove to his destination. The contact took the vehicle to the local dealer and made them aware of the failure. The vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired. Upon investigation, the contact associated the failure with NHTSA ID Number: 10183774, however his year, make and model were not included. The manufacturer had been informed of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 160,000.
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 1792574 |
| ODI Number | 11450444 |
| Date Filed | February 4, 2022 |
| Failure Date | February 1, 2022 |
| VIN | 1FMCU92144D |
Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.
Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.