2013 here, hail/thunderstorm came through town and now car won't start!

[graacaaye]

Hi! New user here. Super confused as well. I figured what better place to share my story than to a Ford Fiesta specific forum lol... Well, Thursday it stormed in my city. It was supposed to hail, so I parked my car under the tree in front of my house to try to prevent too much hail damage. Long story short, my car wouldn't start Friday. I went to turn it on like I normally would and the engine wouldn't turn. Dash lights up, car lights come on, car can be locked and unlocked via key fob. We called a family friend mechanic, he told us to call a vehicle locksmith?? We thought maybe keys were deprogrammed? Locksmith told us that keys were good but his fancy machine wouldn't read my computer. He said that my ECM wouldn't read his machine. He said it's probable that my car may have been struck by lightning, but there are no signs indicating that. My grandpa mentioned that his family members have Ford trucks and that they have a sensor that locks they car up if it's been jerked a bit too hard, like in the case of an accident?? One of his nephews hit a pretty rough pothole and it caused the sensor to turn the truck off. I'm really confused. I have an appointment for it to be seen by my local Ford dealership, but I think we all know it'll cost an arm and a leg. Anyone have any idea what it might be? Any at home remedies I could try? BTW, I am a 23 y/o girl would has owned 2 cars, my last was an Altima in which the transmission failed because I wasn't aware that transmission oil was a thing... If that gives you any idea of the type of language I will understand in your answers LOL. TIA

 

[Handy Andy]

An easy way to "restart" the system is to just pull the Ground Battery cable - the one on the NEGATIVE post - off, leave it off with the interior light turned on - and let it sit for 10 minutes, (that light may be off but this helps drain any residual charge left on the system to properly power it down and then re-power it back up) then reattach the ground cable back on - which should bring interior light back on - and you should be able to recover the LOCK/UNLOCK keyfob function.

Then the vehicle can (should be able to be) restart.

Now if this does not work, then the possibility of local electrical lighting strike may have caused damage to the PCM and will require a tow to the shop to investigate.