I just came thru a heavy rain with local street flooding. The Dakota died!!!
What on or around the engine on the 3.9's commonly gets wet enough to kill the engine!!The truck is a 2000 model year.

 

just died completly? thats werid. IF you got water in your intake to the engine it would sputter then die. Id be checking for other problems

 

you probably got water on the distributor cap. did it just die? did it sputter? check to see if there is moisture on or around your distributor cap.

 

How rain were you going through? As long as your hood was down and not driving through a river the rain fall shouldn't have down anything. I would be looking about to make sure it's not anything else that is major. Does the engine crank when you try to start it? If it doesn't do anything then I would first check your battery. Maybe your alternator went out and wasn't charging the battery and then you ran out of juice in the battery.

 

mentioned before that moisture at the distributor... but also... it could of been pure coincidence and the distributor just died... happened to me in a 95' chrysler cirrus.... just going down route 80.. 75... next thing i know.... engine is sputtering.... dead

 

Coil is in a area that it could had got hit hard enough by spray to pop the coil wire off. But Take the distributor cap off, spray wd40 all over the inside of the cap and rotor and reassemble. Check the cap for cracks before you put it back on though.

 

check your crank shaft position sensor. it right by the block and the tranny....i had the same problem..my truck had a bad misfire in the rain..when it was dry it ran like a champ. $97 for the sensor and it was fixed

 

+1! good thinking!