snagitseven

While fires from leaving the engine running while fueling are very rare, besides the unnecessary waste of gas, the dubious benefit of keeping the car from losing warmth warm in five minutes and the chance of someone jumping in the car and taking off, leaving you with a detached hose spewing gas, why take a chance? All it takes is that one rare time to end up being a poster child for a fire safety brochure.

JokerzWld

The primary reason its done in the South is to facilitate "drive offs" when running moonshine.

NightCrawler

I've never heard or seen of one incident caused by leaving a car running. I frankly don't see the difference between running my engine if I'm pumping gas, and the person behind or aside of me starting/running their vehicle. Many times their engines are actually closer to my tank then my engine is. Do you stop fueling whenever someone pulls in aside or behind you? I do understand the dangers of static, thus I do not return to my car or use my cell phone while fueling.

PBPhantom

With my bmw, leaving the engine running with the gas cap open may result in an oxygen sensor tripping the check engine light.

Mike_L

Not the oxygen sensor, its the EVAP system.

tenspeed

Same as having a bad filler cap seal or leaving the cap loose. Modern cars have a vacuum on the tank to draw the fumes through the intake.

snagitseven

I had the evap issue with my wife's allroad - bad seal on the gas cap and had to replace it. I would imagine this might cause an issue trying to fill the tank with the engine running. At best it would pull a fault code. At worst ?

Mike_L

At worst, vapors build up, static electricity ignites them and you have a big, expensive, cluster**** that your insurance won't cover because the car was running while you were fueling.

Totti808

Thanks For the replies . I will make sure that this issue gets fixed at my next service visit.

jjsC6

I'm with you. I can't for the life of me think of how the engine running would cause a hazard. What I can believe is that fires start from people getting back in and out of their car while fueling and under the right conditions static electricity from sliding in or out of their car causes a spark.