I was driving down the road in my 06 corolla and it felt like someone hit me from behind, and then my car just stopped driving. I can turn on the engine still. The gear selector is still connected to under the hood (tow truck guy showed me thinking it was just the bushing at first).
Weird thing is, my car even at a few hundred thousand miles shifted through all the gears rather normally till now. No noticeable slip or high Revs. Now my corolla doesn't move at all. What broke?
Something completely different to check - make sure you don't have a broken drive axle or CV joint. That would result in the car not being able to move.
What broke?
Sounds like your transmission cratered on you. (You did not provide details but presumably you have an automatic transmission.)
You won't know for sure what happened though until a mechanic looks at it.
What part of the transmission does this sound like? Because it still shifted fine. And could changing the fluid have caused this?
To add, the trans fluid was changed with Castrol atf about 10k miles ago. I've used valvoline a few times in the past. I don't think this is useful info but am still including it. It still shifted but it won't go into any gear anymore. It's a brick.
What part of the transmission does this sound like?
Automatic transmissions are complex with many parts. A post-mortem examination by a transmission expert would be needed to determine that. It's also possibly a failure in the electronics but the jolt you reported feeling strongly suggests internal mechanical failure.
Because it still shifted fine.
Irrelevant. Years ago I had one that "shifted fine" until one day a band suddenly broke internally due to metal fatigue.
And could changing the fluid have caused this?
Not likely unless either it had not been serviced in a very long time before the latest change, a power flush was done, or the fluid was completely wrong for that transmission.
