2022 Thor Motor Coach Omni

Our 2022 Thor Omni BT36 motor home has a Latitude awning made by Carefree of Colorado. On our 3rd trip in the RV, as we started to extend the electric awning, it suddenly flew out from the RV, one of the gas struts on the side of the support arms flew off, and the support arm on the motor side ended up hanging loose. The awning roller bar was hanging down on the motor side, which had disconnected from the support arm on one side. I spoke with a technician at Carefree of Colorado, who told me there should have been an e-clip installed on the awning roller spindle between the support arm and the gearbox/motor assembly. The e-clip holds the awning roller bar in place, so it stays inserted in the motor assembly. The motor assembly is the only thing preventing the awning from unexpectedly deploying. We had an RV technician assist us with retracting the awning. He removed the plastic housing that covers the motor and discovered that no e-clip had been installed between the support arm and the gearbox/motor assembly. The vibration from driving the RV had caused the roller spindle to simply vibrate out of the motor assembly. As soon as we started to open the awning, the spindle came out of the motor completely, leaving the roller spindle moving freely. The gas struts on either side of the awning caused the awning to fly out in an uncontrolled manner. There is no other safeguard that prevents uncontrolled deployment of the awning other than the small e-clip holding the roller bar in place within the motor. We were incredibly fortunate to be parked in an RV park when this incident occurred. Had we been traveling down a highway at 65 mph when the awning roller spindle came out of the motor, the awning would have deployed without warning and undoubtedly been ripped off and thrown into moving traffic. It is incomprehensible to me that the entire integrity of the awning rests on a single small e-clip that can be missed during installation.