parking brake was on?

 

A dent in the tail pipe or a mud/rock plugged pipe.

Then again a clogged air intake .

Or possibly a clogged fuel filter which sounds the best for the conditions.

 

They drove onto hot, molten lava.

 

gets my vote

 

ok still havent seen the right answer so ill tell ya. it was actually the ignition switch. dont ask me how that affected all that, but an extremely good mechanic checked everything out, replaced the ignition switch and that fixed everything. i dont know much about cars but it seems extremely odd that the ignition switch would affect the exhaust and speed like that.

 

 

"liquid hot mag-ma"

 

My one teacher used to say "MAGMA" so dramatically it was so damn hilarious

 

you got to call this guy and ask how. only thing i can think is that the starter motor did not retract and the motor had the strain of turning the starter, causing the overheating.