Toyota Repair: 99 Sienna BAD steering issues, toyota sienna xle, catastrophic failure

Question
Thank you for taking my question.

'99 Toyota Sienna XLE, 100,300 miles, one owner, excellent maintenance history

12 days ago, we had the entire rack and pinion replaced with a new toyota part at our local dealer, due to bad bushings. (Symptoms were van had a delay in steering and some clunking when going over bumps, both stopped after the repair)

Today, while backing out of a parking spot (thank God this didn't happen while I was at highway speed) I had the intermediate steering shaft/column (?) come completely disconnected.  There was a slight "clunk" and then the steering wheel had no resistance and would free spin.  Towed back to same dealer and they "reconnected" it.  Is this a common problem and what in the world would cause such a catastrophic failure of this sort?  We bought the Sienna because of safety ratings, but in the last 2 weeks I have lost complete confidence in this van.

Thank You

Answer
Don't lose confidence in the van, lose confidence in the repair shop that did the repair, they obviously forgot to connect or tighten something,did they give you an explanation why this happened and what they "reconnected" not that it really matters because they are probably going to lie to you anyway to cover up their mistake. Have you contacted the service manager of the dealership and demanded an explanation? If he won't, I would just not go back there again, if they offer you some sort of explanation please let me know what that may be, I would be interested in hearing this.