Category: Blog

Bloomberg reports on cover-up problems with the Takata airbag scandal.  One tragic case illustrates the life and death importance to crash victims.

“Mincey Lawsuit

In one instance, Takata’s manipulation of air-bag inflator test results in 2000 emerged last year as part of a lawsuit against the company on behalf of Patricia Mincey, a Florida woman who became a ventilator-dependent quadriplegic following a low-speed collision in her 2001 Honda Civic. Honda recalled the vehicle four days after the incident in June 2014. Mincey died earlier this year.

Before Takata agreed to settle the Mincey lawsuit last week, several current and former engineers said in depositions that the company also altered and misrepresented test data in reports to Toyota Motor Corp., Nissan Motor Co. and General Motors Co.

Brian Mayville, a Takata engineering manager, said during a deposition taken in November that select reports were not properly represented to Toyota and GM.” 

See  http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/international/2016/07/19/420381.htm

An excellent article in the NY Times reports:

Photo

The interior of a Jeep Grand Cherokee. Problems with the car involve an electronic gearshift, whose operation is similar to that of a video-game joystick. Credit Joe Raedle/Getty Images

“The death of the actor Anton Yelchin, killed when his Jeep Grand Cherokee rolled backward down a driveway and crushed him against a mailbox pillar last weekend, has cast a public spotlight on a problem with some models of Jeeps and other Fiat Chrysler vehicles.

But for the company, there is nothing new about the issue — which federal regulators first flagged last August.

The question is why, nearly a year later, Fiat Chrysler has still not come up with a fix for the problem, which has now been linked to hundreds of accidents, dozens of injuries and now — potentially — a well-publicized death.

The company, which issued a recall notice on more than one million affected vehicles in April, will say only it is still working on a solution, there was no decision about a recall until this year and there has been no delay. It has written to federal regulators that the remedy will include a software change and “an additional mechanism to mitigate the effect of operator error.”

That solution is expected no later than July or August, a Fiat Chrysler spokesman, Eric Mayne, said on Tuesday in an email.

And yet, as far back as March, Fiat Chrysler was telling federal investigators that it already had “potential solutions.”

The problem involves an electronic gearshift, whose operation is similar to that of a video-game joystick. It has confused many drivers, who thought they had left their cars in park, only to find they were in neutral, and started rolling away after the drivers stepped out.

Rollaway accidents are particularly dangerous, and the investigation and recall are taking too long, Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a consumer advocacy group, said on Tuesday.

“There was no sense of urgency on Chrysler’s part or N.H.T.S.A.’s part given the potential for death or injury,” he said in an interview, referring to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.”  See http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/22/business/anton-yelchins-death-highlights-a-known-issue-with-jeeps.html

Lou

Lou Lombardo

Marianne Karth asks our help as follows:

On D-Day, Monday, June 6, 2016, STARTING at NOON (EST), help me flood the media with this message in reply to President Obama (see the sharing links below):

President Obama,

Thank you for your sympathy and kind words. But what I, and over 20,000 Vision Zero Petition signers, want is for you to do what no one else in this country can do: Make Traffic Safety a National Priority!

1. Set a National Vision Zero Goal to move us toward zero crash deaths.
2. Establish a White House Vision Zero Task Force.
3. Sign a Vision Zero Executive Order; and
4. Appoint a National Traffic Safety Ombudsman to oversee our progress in making our  roads safer.

Looking forward to hearing from you again soon,

Marianne Karth

Please share this Traffic Safety Virtual Flash Mob Game Plan with others before Monday, June 6, D-Day:

1. Read this post.
2. Put this Virtual Event on your calendar.
3. Share this blogpost with others who you think might want to help.
4. On Monday, June 6, 2016, D-Day starting at noon EST, post this vital message –using every form of social media at your disposal:

• Share on Twitter: @PresidentObama @POTUS  Do something about 33,000 crash deaths/yr. Make Traffic Safety a National Priority! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yX-3CPyGA7c 
• Send a message to @President Obama on Facebook: President Obama, Make Traffic Safety A National Priority 
• Share this YouTube video: https://youtu.be/dOP9H_rOi4w

See http://annaleahmary.com/2016/06/i-got-an-email-from-president-obama-this-week/

Marianne Karth is upset – as we all should be – by President Obama’s words and continued inaction in his last days as President.

“Dear President Obama,

I sat at my computer the other day and listened to you speak at a Town Hall on PBS News Hour (recorded June 1, 2016).

You said that crash fatalities were a major public health problem — as if they no longer are. You implied that we have already done, or are already doing, everything possible to prevent 33,000 people from dying on the roads of our country every year.

In fact, your attitude brushes off my daughters’ deaths as inevitable rather than potentially preventable.  It sounds like, to you, their deaths — their lives —  weren’t worth enough to put out the additional effort needed to decrease the fatality rate to the fullest extent possible. And not once have you acknowledged our petition for Vision Zero action.

Let me tell you, that makes me mad! Would you be any less so were your family in our shoes?! Would that change your tune about the acceptability of the current crash fatality rate? Would you suddenly speak out against the decades of political tug-of-war which delay — over and over — needed safety measures?

Would you go beyond talking about it and do what no one else can do: lead the way in setting our entire nation (and not just some programs in the USDOT or scattered efforts in states, cities, and communities) on a course of aggressively moving toward zero crash deaths & serious injuries?

Would you, in fact, make Traffic Safety a national priority–placing it on the list of important issues listed on whitehouse.gov and then do something about it, e.g.,:

1. Set a National Vision Zero Goal?
2. Establish a White House Vision Zero Task Force?
3. Sign a Vision Zero Executive Order to allow Vision Zero Rulemaking?
4. Get We the People involved in the action and the solution by promoting the development of a nationwide network of Traffic Safety/Vision Zero Community Groups?
5. Appoint a Traffic Safety Ombudsman who would oversee all of this and be an  Advocate for vulnerable road users (which includes us all) —untainted by political pressures?

President, Obama, don’t be misled by DOT’s commitment to the TZD (Toward Zero Deaths) initiative. It is obviously not enough. I should know; I have spent endless hours engaged in a battle for safer trucking, and others have spent many more years doing so.

Take the bull by the horn, make use of the authority invested in you as the leader of this country, and end this public health travesty. And please, talk to me about this; show me that you are not ignoring our heartfelt, data-driven pleas.

On behalf of AnnaLeah & Mary (and countless others), who can no longer speak for themselves,

Marianne Karth

p.s. What is stopping you from taking this action which would benefit us all?

On the PBS News Hour, June 1, 2016, starting at 1:57 to about 3:05 on this video,  hear President Obama speak about the crash fatality rate:

https://www.facebook.com/newshour/videos/10154247237078675/

The President has the responsibility and power to do that which Marianne Karth is asking for and he should do so – unless there is a higher political power stopping him.

For Vision Zero goals set by others around the world see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero

Lou