This afternoon the rear door (hatch, trunk) on our 2017 Prius Prime decided it no longer wanted to open. With all doors unlocked, I push the rubber button on the outside of the trunk, above the rear license plate (which worked for years, up until today), and hear a faint noise like it's trying to open the hatch, but it won't open. Per the Owner's Manual, I tried pushing the little black lever down (marked with the red arrow in the image) using a screwdriver and it moves easily, but doesn't unstuck the rear door. When the rubber button is pushed from the outside, the little black lever (marked with the red arrow) moves down, but the trunk still won't open. Any thoughts on what might be going on? I tried searching the forums and didn't see anything that spoke to this issue, but sorry if I missed something. Thanks in advance for any insight.
I just looked at mine. It looks to me like yours is partly unlatched. Maybe something got caught in there. My wife got a piece of cloth caught in the latch on her Gen 2. I had to hold the release and push mighty hard on the inside of the hatch to get it to let go.
I had a similar experience a while back and, as in Jerry's case, the edge of a movers blanket was preventing the hatch from fully closing by an almost undetectable amount. Pushing down on the hatch allowed it to complete its cycle, fully latch and then release.
My experience has been that I move the latch - which you indicated you did with a screw driver - but you have to push on the glass of the hatch with your back, or have someone lift the hatch from outside, to actually get the latch to disengage.
