Verified government source

NHTSA complaint #11718307

This page summarizes an official U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration owner complaint. Use the verification links below to confirm the record directly with NHTSA.

Vehicle

2020 HYUNDAI SANTA FE

Manufacturer

Hyundai Motor America

Components

STRUCTURE

Dates

Incident: 08/26/2025
Filed: 02/16/2026

Owner complaint summary

The roof of my car between the sunroof and the windshield (called panoramic sunroof) shattered as I was driving down the highway. It was about 10:00 pm on a weeknight and there were no cars within sight distance in front of me. When it happened it sounded like a gun shot going off at point blank range and I immediately pulled over and checked for bullet holes. Since it was dark I could not see any damage. Today I took the car and had a small chip fixed in my windshield down by the windshield wipers and the service tech pointed out to me that the roof was shattered. He told me that this happens a lot with this vehicle. So I got online and searched and found a lot of vehicles have reported the exact problem. Down to the sounds of gunshots. So I stopped at my local Hyundai dealership and recorded the conversation. He told me that theres no recalls on this car and It probably shattered by a rock or debris. I told him that when this happened it was late night and no cars within sight in front of me. He didn’t even come out and look at the damage. He said to call my insurance company and I said that is a manufacturer defect and I shouldn’t have to pay for their mistake. When I searched for this on the internet people stated that the dealerships will deny this manufacturer defect and that’s exactly what they said to me. My main concern is that this defect is documented by many vehicle owners from their 2020 vehicles and their Is a recall out for this problem but it stops at 2016 models. In this recall the shattered piece is replaced and there is actually compensation given for people getting scared or dealing with stress dealing with thinking they are getting shot at. I don’t care about any of that. I just want the issue fixed because I did not cause the issue, the manufacturer did. Reason being is that the exact thing is happening to numerous people across the Country. Thank you for your time.

This is an owner complaint filed with NHTSA (ODI #11718307). It is not automatically an official recall, investigation outcome, or manufacturer admission unless the complaint text itself describes one.

Official record ID (ODI): 11718307. This page is the human-readable source link used across afterwarranty. The raw JSON link proxies NHTSA's public API for machine verification; prefer this page when reading the complaint.