Here's a good one, jet engine related, but not quite failure.

There was once a testbed car called the Firebird X-1, a jet engine car, very very bleeding edge, not user friendly at all.

It was more of a testbed to find out what would be needed to make this tech into a real car.

Anyway, rumor was, a certain GM VP decided he was going to take this car for a joyride(all parties involved are now dead, so consider this fiction), and discovered some serious serious turbo lag when he put the pedal down. Putting your foot to the floor in a jet engine car that will do 100mph in first gear is unhealthy. So, the car is going pretty damned fast when he's going into a turn on the test track, lets his foot off the gas, but that doesn't matter since it's gonna be a while before the fuel completes its burn through the engine, and for the developed torque to die down. No problem, kick in the clutch right? Well, it's a jet engine car, with no exhaust diffuser, so it's kinda like an f-16 with direct propulsion from the jet engine even if someone gets on the clutch fast enough.

He doesn't get on the clutch fast enough, and the X-1 takes flight off a curve. All of this information is buried, and a new X-1 gets fabricated. GM gets a new VP, because the old one is broken. :D