A Georgetown man claims his car's dash cam video captured a Firestone technician driving recklessly while taking his car on a routine test drive.
Jeremy Gulick said he dropped his 2017 Subaru WRX off at the Firestone Complete Auto Care location in Round Rock Monday morning to get new tires and an alignment.
"When I went and picked up the car, I checked the dash cam footage, and when I pulled up and looked at the video, I saw him driving not very pleasantly to the transmission or to the engine. Not very safe down some of the back roads," Gulick said.
The dash cam video captured the technician driving out of a parking lot and onto the I-35 frontage road, quickly accelerating.
"And you can hear it bounce off the rev limiter, as they're also dumping the clutch on the shift. And then they pull up and turn right onto a side street," he said.
As the Firestone technician and his passenger begin to turn onto Paloma Drive from the frontage road, the test drive takes a risky turn.
In the video, you can see the 30 mph speed limit sign at the center right of the frame, but the dash cam's software shows the technician driving nearly double the speed limit while weaving in and out of the center turn lane.
"There's no reason to drive the car like that, especially after doing a cold start and just doing an alignment. There's no reason to do hard shifts or speed through rural streets like that," Gulick said.
Gulick reached out to Firestone about the matter as soon as he saw the footage.
"I just want to make sure that it doesn't happen again, that it doesn't happen to other people who may not know about it because they don't have a dash cam in their car," he said.
A spokesperson for Bridgestone Americas, which owns Firestone, sent KVUE the following statement:
"Employees at Bridgestone Retail Operations are committed to treating customers and their vehicles with care and respect. The incident that occurred at the Firestone Complete Auto Care store in Round Rock, Texas is highly unusual and does not in any way reflect the high standards of safety, professionalism, and customer service to which our employees are held. While we do not publicly disclose confidential personnel matters, Bridgestone Retail Operations wants to assure customers that we take appropriate disciplinary action any time misconduct is identified."
Gulick said he's prepared in case someone else does this again.
"I still have the dash cam, so if it does happen again," he said, "I have the evidence of them not driving appropriately in my car again."