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Engineering
Firm Requests NHTSA Investigation, Alleging Ford Explorer Roof May Be Out of
Compliance with Federal Standard 216; Another Death in Another Flipping Ford
Explorer Brings Another Multimillion-Dollar Verdict
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Engineering Firm Requests NHTSA Investigation, Alleging Ford Explorer Roof May Be Out of Compliance with Federal Standard 216; Another Death in Another Flipping Ford Explorer Brings Another Multimillion-Dollar Verdict
By James B. Bleeker
Per the Detroit News:
1. U.S. safety standard 216, in effect since 1971, requires a motor vehicle's roof to withstand a force of at least 1.5 times the vehicle's unloaded weight. The ratio of (strongest force withstood)/(vehicle's unloaded weight) is referred to as the strength-to-weight ratio.
2. Safety Analysis and Forensic Engineering (SAFE Research), a California engineering firm providing research for litigating parties, has petitioned the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to investigate whether Ford Motor Company manufactured and sold Ford Explorers out of compliance with U.S. safety standard 216.
3. Attached to SAFE Research's petition is a report by a Ford engineer, R.G. Roose, entitled, "1999 Explorer Roof Crash Certification (FMVSS 216)." The report summarized May 1999 tests of the 1999 Ford Explorer that yielded a strength-to-weight ratio of only 1.48. The report gave the vehicular weight of the 1999 Ford Explorer as 4,700 pounds, the same vehicular weight given in the 1993 and 1995 certification tests.
4. At some point subsequent to the typing of the above report, the "4,700" pounds was crossed out and replaced with "4,600" pounds. This gave the 1999 Ford Explorer a strength-to-weight ratio of 1.52, per the above tests, a tad exceeding safety standard 216's 1.5.
5. Stephen Forrest, senior engineer at SAFE Research, argues that even if the vehicular weight of the 1999 Ford Explorer were 4,600 pounds (rather than the 4,700 pounds in the original report), still many Ford Explorers of the 1999-2001 model years would be out of compliance as a result of the normal variation from vehicle-to-vehicle.
6. Apparently to cope with normal variation, Ford Motor Company had a strength-to-weight standard for other vehicles of 1.875 - 1.25 times the U.S. safety standard of 1.5.
7. The May 1999 tests are the only tests of the 1999-2001 Ford Explorer known to have been conducted by Ford Motor Company. However, Ford officials interviewed by the Detroit News said that that all of the tests that it has conducted demonstrated that the 1999-2001 Ford Explorer complied with standard 216. When Detroit News requested copies of the reports on the tests demonstrating such, Ford declined to offer any.
NHTSA said that it plans to respond to the petition within the customary 120 days.
The penalties that NHTSA can levy are inconsequential (not more than $925,000) relative to existing multimillion-dollar jury verdicts in Explorer rollover cases and future verdicts that may arise from the hundreds of outstanding Explorer rollover lawsuits. Nonetheless, an adverse finding by NHTSA may make winning future rollover trials easier.
Putting strong roofs in vehicles with high centers of gravity and other flipping-enhancing traits is likely a clever thing to do.
Meanwhile, NHTSA has proposed upping standard 216 to 2.5; consumer groups have argued that even this is inadequate.
Separately, Ford Motor Company was hit with a $61-million jury award in a case involving a Ford Explorer that flipped, as the driver tried to regain control after allegedly dosing off (per Ford), and a 17-year-old passenger who died. The plaintiff family of the deceased passenger alleged that the Explorer was unstable and prone to rollovers; Ford denied it; the jury concurred with the plaintiff.
Source for SAFE Research's petition and surrounding circumstances: "Explorer Roof Called Too Weak," Detroit News, Jeff Plungis, November 20, 2005, at http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0511/20/A01-387645.htm
Sources for $61-million judgment: "Jury Awards $61 Mln in Ford Rollover Case," Reuters, November 17, 2005, available at Yahoo! News, and "Ford Ordered to Pay $61M in SUV Accident," Jennifer Kay, the Associated Press, November 16, 2005, available at Yahoo! News
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