Category: Blog

Takata’s Tragic Airbag Mess – A Suggestion for A Safer Future


Takata’s Tragic Airbag Mess – A Suggestion for A Safer Future

November, 2014

Dear care for Crash Victims Community Members:

Takata’s Tragic Airbag Mess

Takata is going through a deservedly terrible time facing mounting financial losses and calls for Federal criminal investigation of tragic mismanagement decisions.  See excellent coverage athttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/08/business/criminal-inquiry-into-takata-airbag-allegations-is-sought.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0
Suggestions For A Safer Future

I would like to offer a silver lining of hope for positive changes for safety that may result from this tragic current reality.  With first hand knowledge, I can say that Takata has excellent scientists and engineers of integrity that can, and are needed to, advance safety with airbag technologies in and outside of automobiles.  For examples, think pedestrian protection outside autos and child protection inside autos.

A recent NY Times series of articles on falls among the elderly reminded me of a long gone pioneering leader in the development of airbags – Dr. Carl C. Clark that I had the privilege to work with at NHTSA.

The NY Times reported on CDC statistics as follows:“The dangers are real. The number of people over 65 who died after a fall reached nearly 24,000 in 2012, the most recent year for which fatality numbers are available — almost double the number 10 years earlier, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And more than 2.4 million people over 65 were treated in emergency departments for injuries from falls in 2012 alone, an increase of 50 percent over a decade. All told, in the decade from 2002-2012, more than 200,000 Americans over 65 died after falls. Falls are the leading cause of injury-related death in that age group.”

See http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/11/03/health/bracing-for-the-falls-of-an-aging-nation.html?module=Search&mabReward=relbias%3Aw%2C{%221%22%3A%22RI%3A8%22}http://www.cdc.gov/homeandrecreationalsafety/falls/adultfalls.html

I would add that an aging population is not just a problem in the U.S. but in Japan and other places around the world.

Eighteen years ago, and perhaps 300,000 American fall deaths of people over the age of 65 in the U.S. alone, the Baltimore Sun wrote an article about Dr. Clark’s prescient work.  

“As his grandchildren’s laughter filters through the screen door, Carl Clark talks about his commitment to cushioning life’s blows. Retired from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the 73-year-old scientist is still advocating interior air bags for airplanes, trains and school buses. He’s promoting ,, exterior air bags that spring from auto bumpers. He’s even invented a wearable air bag that inflates to prevent broken hips in the elderly.

Clark has spent 35 years urging the use of air bags — a concept he helped develop in 1961. Now, faced by widespread alarm over air bag-caused deaths, his biggest fear is that people will disconnect the devices he’s worked so hard to give them.”

A Safer Future Is Ahead – But Why Does it Take So Long?
I have worked for many years with good scientists and engineers.  I have also seen too many bad management decisions in both corporations and government agencies that have caused too much needless death and injury to the public.  
Ralph Nader, in his new book “Unstoppable” recommends 25 Reforms.  One is that we “Allow taxpayers the standing to sue, especially immunized governments and corporations.”
Then maybe it would not take so long to save lives and prevent tragedies for people and organizations – and we would create a Safer Future sooner.
Lou

 

While GM & NHTSA Fiddle Crash Victims Burn


While GM & NHTSA Fiddle Crash Victims Burn

November, 2014

Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:

Too Little Too Late For Too Many Crash Victims

The NY Times reports:

“Nearly nine months after General Motors began recalling millions of its cars for a dangerously defective ignition switch, almost half of the vehicles still have not been fixed….

One of the unrepaired vehicles was a red 2006 Chevrolet Cobalt that crashed here the night of Oct. 9, killing its 25-year-old driver, Brittany Alfarone. Her mother, Dierdre Betancourt, said she had tried to fix the car twice, but two dealers turned her away….

Joseph Brini was driving behind Ms. Alfarone the night of the accident. He said it seemed as if the driver was wrestling with the car. “My feeling is she was trying to get some control,” he said. “The poor girl had no control of the car.”

The vehicle slammed into a guardrail and erupted in flames. The county medical examiner listed the cause of death as thermal burns, asphyxiation because of carbon monoxide and laceration of the liver, a condition that some auto engineering experts say suggests, based on Ms. Alfarone’s slight build, the airbag did not deploy.”  See

Automotive News reports: “A program to compensate victims of accidents caused by a faulty ignition switch in General Motors vehicles has received 1,772 claims for injuries and deaths, a 12 percent increase from the previous week, according to a report updated today. ”  Seehttp://www.autonews.com/article/20141103/OEM11/141109972/gm-ignition-switch-claims-rise-12-percent
How many more tragedies will Americans experience before this problem is responsibly fixed?
For past, present, and future crash victims will GM still shut the door on claims on December 31, 2014?
For additional Automotive News reference materials on the GM Recall see  http://www.autonews.com/theme/The%20GM%20recall
Remember that there are about 1,000,000 of these Sudden Loss of Power and Control (SLOPAC) defective vehicles still on the roads.   They continue to endanger not just their occupants but all Americans that they may crash into.
When will President Obama call a national conference on this public health problem at the White House?   Before or after more tragedies?
Lou

 

Airbag Tragic Mess, NHTSA Tragic Mess


Airbag Tragic Mess, NHTSA Tragic Mess

November, 2014

Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:

The Automotive News published an excellent article (and related articles) on these two tragic messes.

“For the second time this year, a long-standing defect linked to deaths and injuries has triggered a mushrooming auto-safety crisis, lending more fuel to criticism that federal regulators haven’t done enough to protect consumers from such dangers.

Ten automakers have issued recalls for millions of airbags that, rather than save drivers and passengers in a crash, can explode with a lethal spray of jagged metal.

The flaw is connected to two deaths in what were otherwise fender benders, and two others may be related; just this month, a Florida woman died with such unexpectedly severe gashes in her neck after a crash that police reportedly suspected homicide — until a recall notice for the vehicle arrived the following week.

Perhaps most unnerving to consumers, the problem doesn’t yet appear to be contained. On Wednesday, Oct. 22, two automakers told Automotive News that they couldn’t say for sure whether all of the bad airbags had been identified….After watching the agency she ran in the 1970s stagger last week, former NHTSA Administrator Joan Claybrook put it bluntly: “I think they’re having a meltdown.”…. “I am flummoxed by this,” Claybrook said, dismissing the regional tack as a cost-saving maneuver. “This is not a regulatory agency; it’s an auto industry booster agency.””

See http://www.autonews.com/article/20141026/OEM11/310279955/nhtsa-back-in-cross-hairs-as-airbag-crisis-escalates

The tragic truth continues to emerge.   The Obama Administration’s feckless failures to protect Americans continues to produce tragedies.  Shameful, willful, repeated inaction and actions putting and keeping corporate servants in positions of power and influence over people’s lives.  Not what the American people voted for but what corporate lobbyists pay for.  Picture the $4 billion to influence just this year’s election.  

Lou

 

Treasury’s Halloween Trick on GM Crash Victims


Treasury’s Halloween Trick on GM Crash Victims

November, 2014

Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:

How high up does the corporate captivity of the Federal Government go?

“The U.S. Treasury says confidential information it got in the bailout of General Motors Co. (GM)should stay secret, otherwise at-risk companies needing government help in the future might not be willing to share data.

The Center for Auto Safety, now researching GM’s ignition-switch defects, sued in 2011 for information the government obtained before investing $49.5 billion in the automaker. It got more than 50,000 documents and wants additional records on the U.S. role in a judge’s ban on lawsuits over older GM cars. The Treasury asked a judge to throw out the lawsuit…. 

Still, highlighting the risks, the Treasury’s bailout fund lost $11.2 billion on its investment by December when it sold its remaining shares in the new GM, according to a May government report.

Clarence Ditlow, president of the Washington-based auto safety center, said GM came to the U.S. “hat in hand” and was forced as a condition of getting money to produce the information that he is now seeking. Others will do the same, he said yesterday in an e-mail.

“Disclosure of information will not deter corporations begging for billions in taxpayer dollars from seeking bailout funds in the future,” he said.”

Seehttp://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-30/treasury-seeks-gm-suit-dismissal-as-danger-to-future.html#disqus_thread

Treasury to America:  No you cannot see what the Federal government knew and when it knew it when we gave billions of your dollars to GM.  

The bailout was necessary, but making the details public is also necessary.

Lou

 

GM Crash Victims Payout Plan as of Halloween 2014


GM Crash Victims Payout Plan as of Halloween 2014

November, 2014

Dear Care for Crash Victims Community Members:

Only 2 months left for GM crash victims to make claims to GM Ignition Compensation Program.   Their “deadline” (their word, not mine) is December 31, 2014.  See http://www.gmignitioncompensation.com/index

As of Halloween, GM Administrator Feinberg’s website shows Latest Overall Program Statistics as of October 24, 2014 to be at http://www.gmignitioncompensation.com/docs/program_Statistics.pdf

Claims received “to date” *  192 for deaths, but so far only 30 “determined eligible”

*  102 for “Category One” injuries such as Quadriplegia, but so far only 4 “determined eligible” 
*  1286 for “Category Two” injuries, but so far only 27 “determined eligible”
Note:  “Remaining claims are either under review, deficient awaiting further documentation or deemed ineligible.”  No statistical breakout of these categories is  currently publicly available.  See http://www.gmignitioncompensation.com/docs/program_Statistics.pdf