How Far Can a Prius Drive With No Gas?

We just returned from a week long roadtrip to Southern California, including Legoland, Seaworld, Santa Monica, Santa Barbara and basically everything between here and there. Other than Europe, this is the longest vacation we have ever taken! It was nice to really settle in and fully enjoy each place. Ill post all about the trip, especially Legoland later. But the big news is that was ran out of gas on the way home.

Dad always told me that on a road trip, never let a car go under a 1/4 tank and I have always followed that rule. Apparently, Fred has never heard of that rule! We were in I5 in Central

California where signs identified this patch of desert as a "Congress Created Dust Bowl" and enjoying the sites of dust devils that looked like actual tornadoes and 104 degree temps. When BEEP! said the Prius. I asked "What was that?" "Gas" was the answer. Are you kidding me? We had never driven on this long stretch of highway (we went South via 101/1) and it was a desert with 20+ miles between exits. One minute later the engine turned off and we coasted to the side and thankfully under an overpass.

Anyways, we called AAA and about an hour and 2 gallons of gas later the car still wouldnt start and had all sorts of emergency engine lights were flashing. The kids were very hot and thirsty, somehow we had no water in the car! So they towed us to the next exit 17 miles away.

Fred was convinced we were having some engine problem and I was convinced we were out of gas. He insisted we were not of gas. The tower said something like 8 out of 10 times any problem he gets called on for a Prius is due to it running out of gas. And the Prius owners usually think they aren't out of gas. After it was filled with gas and started a few times it was fine. So after 2hrs or so we were on our way again.

I understand his thoughts. The Prius gets almost 50MPG and on the last bar he estimated he had 2 gallons left, so we could certainly make it to the next stop. But it turns out (after a little research on the iphone while waiting in the sun) in high heat the Prius's gas gauge is wonky and 50MPG is an average. Some miles you may get bad mileage depending on the terrain.

Im sure he will be following Dad's 1/4 tank rule on a roadtrip from now on.