Here’s an article on Nader’s Conference this week.
See http://www.progressive.org/news/2016/05/188742/ralph-naders-democracy-crusade
Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:
An excellent report on pedestrian fatalities is attached.
Findings include:
* Pedestrian Deaths as a percent of Total Traffic Fatalities have risen from 11% to 15% over the years 2005 – 2014
* Pedestrian Deaths remain about 4,800 year – or 13 deaths every average day in the U.S.A. today.
* 72% of Pedestrian fatalities by Light Level occurred in the Dark in 2014.
* 49% of Pedestrian Deaths in 2013 involved alcohol (34% Pedestrian, 15% Driver) in 2013.
As we think about Benefits and Costs we need to think about Who gets the Benefits and Who gets the Costs. People’s lives vs. Corporate monies.
See OMB Draft Report at
CNN reports:
“India has announced new rules that require all mobile phones to have a “panic button,” in order to protect women and prevent rape.
The regulations, which take force in 2017, were announced this week by India’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.
Manufacturers are also required to include GPS in all phones by 2018, in order to help improve security.
Many phone manufacturers already include a panic response feature, but India does not currently have a centralized emergency call system. Because different phone numbers are required to reach police, medical and fire services, the feature has limited utility.
Authorities plan to address the problem with a new national emergency number — 112 — that will roll out in the coming months.”
See http://money.cnn.com/2016/04/27/technology/india-smartphone-panic-button-rape/
Imagine if NHTSA required all cars to have a phone holder such that when crashes above a certain velocity occurred the phone would automatically call 9-1-1 and next of kin listed in the phone, and reported it to NHTSA. And imagine if NHTSA required the phone software to provide a percentage likelihood of a serious injury presence using an URGENCY Algorithm.
We need a government in America as good as in India!
Lou
Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:
Imagine loopholes so big that broken axles are allowed to fall through them by a captive NHTSA. Which is worse – the defect in the Ford axle or the defect in the NHTSA that allowed brackets?
An excellent article addresses matters with life or death consequences.
“May 16, 2016 — Government regulations say automakers must repair recalled vehicles to make sure consumers are safe. But consumer safety advocates say that is not happening in the case of some 1998 – 2003 model year Ford Windstar minivans with rear axles prone to breaking due to rust.
And, they say all consumers should be worried that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration doesn’t see this as a problem.
In 2010 Ford first recalled about 528,000 Windstars, saying a “completely fractured rear axle may lead to a loss of vehicle control” with “little or no warning.” But the automaker told the N.H.T.S.A. not all of them would get a new axle as the result of a recall.
Ford said it would only replace an axle only if it was cracking.
Otherwise, it would install supporting brackets that would “extend axle durability in the presence of corrosion.”
The brackets were intended as a safety device “to prevent any future axle fractures from causing a loss of control,” John Cangany, a Ford spokesman said in an email. “Even with the brackets installed, there was still a potential for the axle to continue to corrode and crack.”
The federal regulators thought that was okay.
“The support brackets that were the recall remedy, eliminated the safety-related consequence if they were properly installed,” Bryan Thomas, the agency’s director of communications, said recently in a statement.
But federal regulations require a repair that will eliminate danger. A couple of brackets to prevent “a loss of control,” doesn’t do that, said Joan Claybrook, a consumer advocate and former head of Public Citizen who was in charge of the N.H.T.S.A. from 1977 to 1981. If Ford’s recall is going to be “lawful” all Windstars should get a new axle, Claybrook said.
The problem is that Ford isn’t replacing the axle, but instead trying to prevent a “catastrophic result” if it breaks, said Allan J. Kam, a safety consultant from Bethesda, Md., who was the senior enforcement lawyer for the agency before retiring in 2000.
Ford’s position is that there won’t be any “catastrophic results.” Just before the recall in 2010, a Ford spokesman said even if an axle broke the driver should be able to maintain control.
But shortly after the 2010 recall was announced, federal regulators took the unusual step of urging owners not to delay getting the problem fixed. The reason was a crash that killed Sean Bowman, a 28-year-old Massachusetts man.”
Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:
Here’s something NHTSA Administrator Mark Rosekind can do – convene a Roundtable on ending Tired Trucker Tragedies.
Here is the Administrator’s expertise in a nutshell https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-r-rosekind-ph-d-0009226/
For all of us, he should heed Marianne Karth’s plea for pulling us together to end Tired Truck (and all vehicle drivers) Tragedies.
Marianne Karth writes:As I was contemplating whether to go next week to Ralph Nader’s Breaking Through Power: A Historic Civic Mobilization, I checked my email and saw that there was a new Public Comment posted on the Federal Register regarding the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on Underride Guards….Somebody, please get me an audience with President Obama next week (now I have to go to that conference). I need him to tell me to my face that it is not a matter of life & death for him to adopt a National Vision Zero Goal, to establish a White House Vision Zero Task Force, and to sign a Vision Zero Executive Order which will pave the way for Vision Zero Rulemaking at DOT.”
