http://www.yourlawyer.com/topics/overview/vehicle_roof_caving Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:18:39 -0800 pixel-app en http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10951 Sun, 20 Nov 2005 00:00:00 -0800 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10951
Safety Analysis and Forensic Engineering, which performs research for plaintiffs suing automakers, says internal Ford documents show that a substantial number of 1999 to 2001 Explorers likely do not comply with the federal vehicle roof strength standard.

The firm is asking the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to investigate. NHTSA has placed the petition and Ford documents collected by SAFE Research in its public docket and plans to respond within 120 days.

"This situation exposes owners of these vehicles to increased risk of serious injury in rollovers," said Stephen Forrest, senior engineer and principal with SAFE Research.

Ford disputes the claims. It said all of its vehicles meet or exceed federal safety standards and SAFE Research misinterpreted company documents and drew conclusions about tests run on an experimental vehicle that was substantially different from the SUVs on the road.

"Members of SAFE primarily earn their living by working for plaintiff attorneys, and much of their data is derived from our own testing of a prototype vehicle that was never sold to the public," said Ford spokesman Dan Jarvis.

The dispute provides a window into the often murky world of big-time auto litigation, where internal documents unearthed during the course of trials are examined and interpreted by both sides.

The latest assertions may only intensify the growing debate over vehicle roof strength. Ford faces hundreds of lawsuits stemming from Explorer rollovers. And the company already has been hit with several multimillion-dollar jury verdicts in cases in which plaintiffs alleged the Explorer's roof is too weak.

The documents cited by SAFE Research were introduced as evidence in a trial in Texas in October stemming from an Explorer rollover accident that killed two teenagers. Forrest testified about the documents filed with NHTSA for the plaintiffs. Lawyers for the plaintiffs said it was settled out of court for an undisclosed amount after Forrest testified.

SAFE Research contends Ford made design changes over the years that weakened the roof of the Explorer. Ford made an exception to an internal company standard to build roofs 25 percent stronger than the federal roof strength minimum, the firm said.

In 1999, years after Ford had certified that its third-generation Explorer met federal safety standards, engineers discovered the roof was weaker than previously thought either below the federal standard or so close to it that some Explorers likely were manufactured below the minimum because of normal variation, according to SAFE Research.

Ford completely redesigned the Explorer for the 2002 model year and beyond.

SAFE Research specializes in roof strength issues, and its engineers have testified on behalf of plaintiffs in numerous rollover trials, many of which have involved Ford. Forrest trained at the General Motors Technical Institute in Flint.

NHTSA spokesman Rae Tyson said the agency usually responds to petitions within 120 days and would offer no comment on the merits of the charges by SAFE Research. "Our compliance people have received it," Tyson said. "We are evaluating it."

If NHTSA finds a vehicle in noncompliance with federal law, the manufacturer is subject to fines and mandatory recalls.

The Ford Explorer has withstood challenges to its safety. The automaker endured years of public relations battering over the Explorer's safety record during the Firestone tire recall.

Bridgestone/Firestone Inc. and numerous safety groups charged the SUV rolled over too easily, adding to the number of crashes, deaths and injuries. NHTSA later found no evidence that the vehicle rolled over more frequently than other comparable SUVs.

In its petition to NHTSA, SAFE Research's charge does not pertain to the Explorer's stability. Rather, the firm contends the 1999 to 2001 Explorer likely does not meet federal safety standard 216, which stipulates that vehicle roofs must withstand a force equal to at least 1.5 times the vehicle's unloaded weight.

Safety advocates have long complained that safety standard 216 is a toothless law that hasn't been updated since 1971. NHTSA has proposed upgrading the 216 test to require a 2.5 strength-to-weight minimum.

A trail of documents

Ford company documents attached to SAFE Research's petition show the automaker relied on the roof-strength tests of an earlier-generation Explorer to certify the 1999 model year. A series of five tests were conducted between Jan. 14, 1993, and March 22, 1995. The Explorer appeared to pass the roof-strength requirement in those tests, averaging a 1.69 strength-to-weight ratio. Ford had an internal roof-strength standard of 1.875, or 25 percent stronger than the federal minimum.

Ford made an exception for the Explorer, as a memo dated March 1992 explains. The memo was called a "Regulatory Engineering Design Standard Deviation." The document outlines that a strength-to-weight ratio of 1.63 would be sufficient for the Explorer, since enough roof-crush tests had been conducted to ensure, within the expected 9 percent testing variation, the SUVs would still exceed the federal minimum of 1.5.In May 1999, while studying whether to change the way the windshield adheres to the body frame, Ford engineer R.G. Roose produced a report titled "1999 Explorer Roof Crush Certification (FMVSS 216)." The test yielded a strength-to-weight ratio of 1.48 with a maximum unloaded-vehicle weight of 4,700 pounds, the same weight used in the 1993 and 1995 certification tests.

But the 4,700-pound weight is crossed out and a weight of 4,600 pounds is used instead, yielding a ratio of 1.52 barely over the federal minimum.

"After the test, the requestor indicated the wrong maximum weight was used," the test report notes.

A second roof-crush test, conducted on Oct. 22, 1999, yielded similar results.

Forrest argued that whether the 4,600-pound or 4,700-pound vehicle weight is used, many Explorers wouldn't meet the standards. That's because normal variation from vehicle to vehicle means a portion of the SUVs sold during that time period would fall below that standard.

The debate ultimately comes down to this: Ford says the roof tests were done on an experimental vehicle that never hit the road; SAFE Research says the documents show that Ford's engineers looked at the issue of whether the modified windshield explained the drop in roof strength and concluded it didn't.

Forrest said the two 1999 tests are the only known instances where Ford conducted a roof-crush test on that version of the Explorer.

"SAFE has analyzed sufficient evidence to suggest that Ford has produced Explorer vehicles to the public that do not pass [safety standard] 216, thus violating federal law," the petition reads.

Ford officials said all of its compliance tests have demonstrated that the 1999 to 2001 Explorer met safety standard 216. The company declined to provide The Detroit News with test reports to support the contention.

Furthermore, Ford said an independent test firm conducted three tests on Explorers and showed that the SUV met standard 216. Forrest said those tests were done specifically for litigation and do not hold as much weight as tests run by Ford engineers. Ford said NHTSA has conducted roof strength compliance tests on two different generations of the Explorer model years 1996 and 2002 and found them to be in compliance.

“Ford Motor Co. is confident that if NHTSA tested the 1999 through 2001 Explorers, it would reach the same conclusion,” Ford spokesman Jarvis said.

Under federal law, manufacturers must certify that their vehicles meet minimum federal safety standards before they can be sold in the United States. Automakers test the vehicles themselves to ensure they comply with the dozens of regulatory requirements. The companies certify their vehicles meet federal standards by placing a label inside the door jamb.

For vehicles that were manufactured before Nov. 1, 2000, the penalty for noncompliance was $1,100 per violation, up to a maximum of $925,000. After the Tread Act was signed into law on that date, the penalties increased to $5,000 per vehicle, up to a maximum of $15 million.

Under the federal Motor Vehicle Safety Act, automakers can be required to recall, replace or buy back any vehicles that are not in compliance.

Other safety experts who have reviewed SAFE Research's filing also are raising questions.

"There's ample evidence to question whether Ford legitimately certified these vehicles," said Carl Nash, a former NHTSA official who now works for XPrts LLC, a research firm in Santa Barbara, Calif., that frequently testifies against automakers in roof-crush cases.

Experts weigh in

Ben Parr, a retired director of automotive research for State Farm Insurance Co. who has been studying the roof strength issue for the last year, reviewed the SAFE Research petition. Parr also has testified against automakers in roof-crush cases.

Before his career at State Farm, Parr was an engineering manager at GM. Parr said when he worked with sheet metal, the rule of thumb was a 15 percent margin of error to provide for adequate safety.

"If you are down to 3 percent, 4 percent, 5 percent, you don't have enough," Parr said. "There goes your cushion."

Campbell Laird, a professor of materials science engineering at the University of Pennsylvania with 45 years of professional experience, reviewed the SAFE Research petition at the request of The Detroit News. Laird has been an observer of the federal work on roof-strength regulations and weighed in with formal comments as NHTSA was preparing to revise safety standard 216.

Laird said SAFE had presented enough evidence to warrant an investigation.

"I find it very plausible," Laird said. "Ford did not meet its own internal standards."

Ford wages legal battle

The charges from SAFE Research are the latest in a series of revelations that have emerged from Ford documents used as evidence in lawsuits. In March, a Jacksonville, Fla., trial involving a 2000 Ford Explorer that rolled over resulted in a $10.2 million verdict for the family of Claire Duncan, a 26-year-old engineer who died from a skull fracture.

Documents introduced in that trial showed that Ford has twice reduced the roof strength of the Explorer as it has redesigned the vehicle. In addition, documents and videos of tests conducted by Ford's Volvo subsidiary called into question Ford's contention that stronger roofs do not provide any meaningful protection against injury.

The Volvo documents showed that the Swedish carmaker, which is considered the industry leader in safety technology, made strenuous efforts to strengthen the roof of its XC-90 SUV to reduce the likelihood of injury in rollover crashes.

Ford has been waging a legal battle to keep its documents out of the public realm.

Normally, documents used as evidence in a jury trial become part of public record. But Ford is arguing in courts in Jacksonville, Fla., and Corpus Christi and Brownsville, Texas, to seal evidence on the grounds it would reveal trade secrets.

Some documents, including Volvo test reports and videos, were placed in NHTSA's public docket earlier this year. NHTSA removed them after Ford objected.
]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10773 Mon, 03 Oct 2005 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10773
The family had sued the automaker, saying the roof of their truck failed to protect Jennifer Garcia in the crash that caused the Ford truck to roll over. The accident occurred as Garcia was traveling with her parents to Corpus Christi in a 1993 Ford F-150 and their truck was struck by a motorist leaving a fruit stand near Sebastian.

Ray Marchan, an attorney for the family, said he hoped the state court lawsuit would result in better products from Ford.

Ford spokeswoman Kathleen Vokes said Ford products are safe and meet strict government safety standards.

"Our condolences go out to the family, but Miss Garcia died because of the negligence of another driver hitting the Garcia vehicle while traveling at highway speeds," Vokes said in a written statement.

"The lack of physical evidence clearly proved that she was not wearing her seat belt. This is another tragic reminder that seat belts can help save lives only when they are worn," Vokes said.

Marchan said Texas Department of Public Safety reports show the girl was wearing her seat belt.

Ford plans to appeal the jury's decision.

The jury found Ford 90 percent at fault in Garcia's death. She spent 18 days in a coma and later died.]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10562 Sun, 21 Aug 2005 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10562
Those proposed new requirements have now been released.

If instituted, the new requirements would affect all vehicles weighing up to 10,000 pounds, overriding the current cut off at 6,000 pounds.

These new regulations regarding vehicle roof strength are only one measure of  NHTSA’s plan to reduce the nearly 10,000 deaths and hundreds of injuries that occur in rollover crashes.
Specifically, the agency aims to reduce the deaths and injuries of passengers wearing seat belts. Currently about 807 serious injuries and 596 fatalities occur annually to these riders from roof collapse.

To improve safety during rollovers the NHTSA is also considering the development of more advanced safety belt technology to keep passengers in their seats during a rollover crash.

However, the NHTSA estimates the new roof crush standard alone will substantially reduce fatalities. It could prevent between 13 and 44 deaths and 500-800 injuries annually once it is in full effect.

Under the new standards a roof would be required to withstand applied forces equal to 2.5 times the vehicle weight without encroaching on the headroom for an average sized adult male. The current requirement is that the roof be able to withstand an applied force equal to 1.5 times the vehicle weight, with a limit of 5,000 pounds for cars.

According to NHTSA, the new roof standards are estimated to cost only $11.81 per vehicle to implement for a total average yearly cost of $88-$95 million.

As expected, the auto industry has taken the position that the new requirements will increase cost without increasing safety while consumer advocates claim the new regulations do not go far enough.

NHTSA will receive comments on the proposal for 90 days. To voice an opinion or see the full proposal visit the government website at: http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/cars/rules/rulings/RoofCrushNotice/216NPRM-to-FR.html]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10539 Fri, 19 Aug 2005 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10539
The need for such changes has been a matter of disagreement between the auto industry and safety groups. Automakers have argued that strengthening roofs does not improve safety on the top-heavy SUVs that tend to rollover more frequently, but whose luxury price tags translate into big profits.

Safety advocates have taken the position that roof strength standards must be more demanding and they will push for tougher regulations and more effective tests that simulate an actual rollover. They contend that the current standard has resulted in weak roofs that are directly responsible for thousands of rollover deaths, particularly in SUVs.

Deaths in rollover crashes, which account for more than one-third of automobile accident fatalities, have increased in 2004 to10,553 from 10,442 in 2003.

Addressing these concerns, the federal rules will apply to large sport utility vehicles and pickup trucks like the Chevrolet Suburban, the Dodge Ram and the Ford Expedition. Currently, the law exempts any vehicle over 6,000 pounds.

Although the new rules will affect future automobile models, they will not serve to end numerous clams automakers already face over the issue of roof strength in the context of ongoing personal injury and wrongful death cases around the country. Juries in Texas, California, and Nebraska have already awarded millions of dollars in damages to rollover crash victims or their survivors.

In a recent Florida trial concerning the rollover of a Ford Explorer, evidence showed that Volvo had made strengthening the roof of its SUV, the XC-90, a priority during the design process. The Volvo documents directly contradicted Ford's longstanding claim that roof strength was unrelated to injury in a rollover crash.
 ]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9607 Tue, 12 Apr 2005 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9607
Time and time again, Ford has faced claims that the Explorer's roof doesn't hold up in a rollover. CBS News has learned of more than 70 lawsuits Ford has settled or lost in recent years.

One of them was Claire Duncan's. She was buckled up when her Explorer flipped and the roof caved in. A jury found the roof defective and said Ford should pay $10 million.

"I couldn't care less about the money," Scott Duncan, the victim's widower, said. "I just wanted to see something done to make a better vehicle."

Ford insists the Explorer roofs meet or beat federal standards. But internal documents produced in some lawsuits reveal chinks in Ford's armor of confidence. And those documents obtained by CBS News question the methods Ford used to prove the roofs really meet the grade.

The original Explorer passed federal roof strength tests but not by the margin Ford's own safety policy called for.

Ford had to issue an internal "deviation" or exception to sell a vehicle falling short of company standards.

As Ford prepared to roll out its 2000 model, the roof continued to be a worry.

"We have a less than desirable safety margin on the Explorer with the current roof crush test procedure" writes a Ford safety officer in an internal e-mail from Oct. 12, 1999. "Without a signoff, we cannot put cert(ification) labels on the vehicles" meaning they cannot be sold.

Under questioning from a victim's attorney, this Ford Engineer admitted there was concern about roof strength.

"I had heard that the safety margin of Explorer warranted in somebody's mind running a physical test," Ford design engineer Tim Chen said in an April 2003 deposition.

"Physical" tests, similar to this one, would help prove how much punishment the Explorer's roof could really take.

But Ford settled for running computer models instead. Computer models that were outdated according to some Ford insiders.

"We can run the (computer) analysis but it would be relatively meaningless," said one supervisor in Ford Crash Safety in an Oct. 14, 1999, Ford Internal e-mail.

"I really doubt the value" says another.

Yet those computer models are what Ford used to show that roofs on 2000, '01 and Explorers meet federal standards. Roofs like Claire Duncan's.

When CBS News asked Ford about all of this, they said: "Engineers frequently debate different methods of testing and there's nothing unusual about different opinions about how to do things."

Higher-ups determined the computer models were adequate. Ford also told Attkisson they eventually did do physical tests of the roof, and confirmed that it holds up.

We asked Ford to show us the test results, but they wouldn't, saying the tests are complex and the results are proprietary.]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9528 Thu, 31 Mar 2005 00:00:00 -0800 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9528
Ford said it had not read the study by a professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, but said strengthening roofs would not further protect people.

The report by Martha Bidez examined tests conducted by Ford that were released as part of a Florida lawsuit involving a 26-year-old woman killed in a rollover accident while driving a Ford Explorer.

Bidez said catastrophic injuries to the head and spinal cord and death result when a roof is crushed in a rollover. Stronger roofs would have better resist being crushed, thus saving lives, she said.

"Strengthening roofs and installing other basic safety devices, such as side head air bags, safety glass and pre-tensioned belts, is the only way to save lives in rollover crashes," said Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen, the group that announced the study's findings.

"If the roofs didn't collapse in a rollover crash, the people in the vehicle have a far better chance of surviving," she said.

The government's auto safety agency, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, is expected to issue new requirements this year about roof strength.

Ford took issue with Bidez's work. "It appears to be based on previous material prepared by Martha Bidez, which is seriously flawed, unscientific, and it misinterprets the data she is relying on," the company said in a statement.

"Simply strengthening the roof won't improve the safety of SUVs and other passenger vehicles in rollovers," the company said. "Years of testing show strengthening the roof will not affect the outcome of the crash for the simple reason that the injury mechanics are not related to how much the roof is deformed in a rollover crash."

Safety groups say that when a roof is crushed, it makes safety belts less likely to work and the occupant is more likely to be ejected from the vehicle.

The study was based on tests released in a Jacksonville, Fla., lawsuit in which Claire Duncan died in a May 2001 rollover crash along Interstate 95 in Virginia.

The Florida jury ruled on March 18 that the Explorer's roof was defective. Ford was ordered to pay Duncan's husband $10.2 million for economic damages, pain and suffering. Ford has said it plans to appeal the verdict.]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9535 Thu, 31 Mar 2005 00:00:00 -0800 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9535
The report, authored by an engineering professor at the University of Alabama and paid for by $200,000 from Tab Turner, contradicts federal testimony by Ford and other automakers that no correlation exists between deformed vehicle roofs and head and neck injuries sustained in rollovers.

The report comes as federal regulators are in the final stages of proposing the first significant upgrades in roof-strength standards in more than 30 years.

The Detroit News reported last year that an estimated 7,000 people are killed or injured annually in rollover accidents in which the roof was deformed, according to federal statistics.

The study of four rollover tests of Ford Explorers conducted in 1998 and 1999 found that the roofs collapsed before injuries occurred to crash-test dummies, according to University of Alabama-Birmingham professor Martha Bidez.

The findings dispute the assertions by automakers that vehicle occupants are injured when they "dive" into the roof during a rollover accident.

In her report, Bidez said that "significant deformation occurred prior to peak injury." The data, she said, establish "a clear causal relationship" between head and neck injuries and crushed roofs.

Ford said in a statement that it had not yet analyzed the study but criticized previous work done by Bidez. "It appears to be based on previous material prepared by Martha Bidez, which is seriously flawed, unscientific and it misinterprets the data she is relying on," Ford said.

The automaker repeated its previous position that roof strength is not a key factor in preventing rollover injuries and fatalities.

"Simply strengthening the roof won't improve the safety of SUVs and passenger vehicles in rollovers," Ford said.

Ford and other automakers face dozens of pending lawsuits related to roof strength in rollover accidents.

On March 18, a Jacksonville, Fla., jury ordered Ford to pay $10.2 million to the family of a woman killed in an Explorer rollover crash where the roof collapsed. Ford has said it plans to appeal the verdict.

A NHTSA spokesman said Wednesday that proposed changes to roof-strength rules first enacted in 1971 will likely be made public this summer.

"We have completed our work on a proposed new standard," said Rae Tyson of NHTSA. "It is undergoing final department review and we should have something out in June or July."

Tyson said the agency had not yet seen the study presented Wednesday.

In the report, Bidez and two associates analyzed data from sensors and video cameras used to document four separate rollover crash tests conducted for Ford by an outside supplier in 1998 and 1999.

In the tests, the Explorers were placed on an angle on a moving dolly that accelerated to 30 miles an hour and then stopped, forcing a rollover.

Data from the tests first surfaced in litigation against Ford, and was referenced last year by Ford in testimony to NHTSA.

According to Bidez, the data show that the Explorer roofs collapsed before injuries were recorded by crash-test dummies. "One-hundred percent of the time, roof-crush preceded the catastrophic injuries measured," Bidez said Wednesday. "Not only was there a relationship established, it was 100% of the time."

One prominent auto-safety advocate said the report underscores the need for tougher federal standards. "Roof strength is absolutely critical to saving lives and preventing injuries in rollovers," said Joan Claybrook, president of Washington-based Public Citizen and former head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Claybrook said Ford and other automakers have "misled" NHTSA by denying any link between roof strength and injuries.

She further criticized the 34-year-old NHTSA roof-strength standard, in which static pressure is applied to one of the A-pillars framing a vehicle's windshield.

Claybrook advocated so-called "dynamic" tests like those Ford performed internally in 1998 and 1999, in which a vehicle is actually rolled over under controlled conditions.

Tyson declined to say what type of test NHTSA will recommend in its proposed revisions to the roof-strength standard.

However, he said regulators "have a lot of problems" with dynamic tests because they are difficult to repeat precisely.]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9523 Wed, 30 Mar 2005 00:00:00 -0800 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9523
"The seat belt did not hold her because the roof had collapsed and there was nothing holding the seat belts," says her mother, Yvonne Morris.

Two weeks into their wrongful death suit against Ford, the company settled.

Wednesday, the advocacy group Public Citizen released a new study on "roof crush" accidents. The conclusion: "Roof crush can and does cause catastrophic injury and death. The science is irrefutable."

"This is a vehicle they know is prone to rollover and yet they took the strength out of the roof in the mid-90s," says Public Citizen president Joan Claybrook.

In Virginia, Claire Duncan died of a fractured skull after her Ford Explorer rolled over. Ford claimed she was run off the road an no onecould have survived the crash that roof strength was not a factor.

But the jury ordered Ford to pay $10 million, after finding that Ford was liable. The plaintiffs introdcued evidence that during the mid-1990s, Ford had weakened its roofs during redesigns, while maintaining the minimum government standard. And in 1999, after Ford bought Volvo, Volvo was sill working to strenthen its roofs.

"I believe that the auto industry has known for years that stronger roofs will save lives," says Claybrook.

For its part, Ford tells NBC News: "Simply strengthening the roof will not affect the outcome of the crash for the simple reason that the injury mechanics (how victims are injured) are not related to how much the roof is deformed in a rollover crash."

But some crash experts disagree.

"There's no question that the strength of a roof has something to do with the ability of occupants to survive a rollover without serious injuries," says Brian O'Neill of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which conducts crash tests on all model vehicles.

Ford and other experts say seat belts and airbags are also crucial to surviving a crash. Public Citizen says the auto industry has long opposed strengthening minimum roof requirements, but this summer, the government is expected to announce a new standard.]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9529 Wed, 30 Mar 2005 00:00:00 -0800 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/9529
The report, written by a professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, debunks what some auto manufacturers have said for years: that in rollover crashes, people sustain head and neck injuries when they dive into the roofs of their vehicles, not when the roofs crush into the peoples heads.

Automakers have made this claim to argue against government requirements for stronger roofs on vehicles and to shield themselves from liability in lawsuits brought by families of rollover crash victims.

But the report written by Martha Bidez, Ph.D., analyzes Fords own tests to show that roof crush does, in fact, occur prior to injurious neck loads during rollovers. Thus, improving a vehicles resistance to roof crush would prevent catastrophic head and spinal cord injuries and deaths.

The report is particularly important because the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is on the verge of proposing a new roof strength standard, although many auto safety experts do not expect it to improve safety in a meaningful way.

The current standard dates from 1971 and has not been updated despite repeated promises by agency officials to do so.

In addition, new industry documents made public only recently show that while Ford has denied a link between roof strength and rollover crash injuries, its subsidiary, Volvo, has recognized that strengthening roofs and installing side head air bags and pre-tensioned belts in rollover crashes will save lives. Volvo produces the XC-90, a vehicle with a roof that does not crush in during rollover tests.

Every year, almost 10,000 people are killed in rollover crashes, and 6,000 to 7,000 deaths a year are related to roof collapse and roof crush.

"Strengthening roofs and installing other basic safety devices, such as side head air bags, safety glass and pre-tensioned belts, is the only way to save lives in rollover crashes," said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook.

"For automakers to claim that head injuries are the fault of people diving into the roofs of their cars is ludicrous. If the roofs dont collapse in a rollover crash, the people in the vehicle have a far better chance of surviving. The industry should strengthen roofs."

Added Bidez, "This report presents the results of some of the industrys own rollover test data as unequivocal evidence that roof crush can and does cause catastrophic injury and death. It underscores the urgent need for a significantly upgraded dynamic roof strength standard to protect belted occupants in rollovers."

The report also shows that:

Ford misrepresented the meaning of its data in presentations to NHTSA;

The dynamic tests done by Ford demonstrated consistent results that could be repeated with dynamic tests when viewed in the framework of occupant injury and correlated with real-world data on rollovers;

Neck position is a crucial component of how severely injured someone is in a rollover crash, yet Ford arranged the neck position of its dummies in some of its published studies, which produced misleading results on the impact on the spinal cord of roof crush; and

Any investigation of roof strength and rollover crashes should analyze total harm to occupants, not just deaths.

The current roof crush standard was enacted in 1971 and took effect in 1973. The one-sided static test requires one section of a vehicles roof to withstand 1.5 times the vehicles weight. The test assumes the windshield remains intact throughout the crash, despite the fact that in rollover crashes, the windshield is usually gone by the first quarter turn.

Once the windshield is gone, the roof loses a third of its strength, making it far more likely that the roof will crush in and making it easier for people to be ejected.

Over the years, NTHSA officials have promised many times to upgrade the standard and require automakers to make stronger roofs. But the agency has dragged its feet and has not issued a rule. The agency is expected to propose a minor upgrade a placebo to respond to demands for stronger vehicle roofs, Public Citizen said.

It is not known whether the agency will address pre-tensioning of belts in rollovers. Currently, there is no federal test for belt performance in rollovers. Side head air bags are the subject of a separate rulemaking, but it does not address inflation in rollovers.

One of the basic tenets of auto safety is that to prevent injuries, there can be little or no intrusion. It is essential to prevent parts of the vehicle from closing in and coming into contact with occupants in the vehicle, Claybrook said. Other key injury prevention techniques involve padding and adequate restraint systems.

So by strengthening roofs and ensuring that they stay intact during rollover crashes and installing side head air bags, safety glass in side windows and pre-tensioned belts, which keep occupants in their seats many of the deaths and injuries that occur in rollover crashes can be prevented, she said.

"The auto industry has misled NHTSA and the public solely to protect its bottom line. But in doing so, it has jeopardized the lives of thousands of motorists every year," Claybrook said.

"NHTSA should not allow itself to be hoodwinked any longer. Automakers know how to increase survivability in rollover crashes, as the documents show. NHTSA needs to require all manufacturers to follow suit."]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10952 Mon, 16 Aug 2004 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/10952
Automakers have contended for years that there’s no solid evidence of a correlation between roof strength and the likelihood of injury and death in rollover accidents.

The new findings, however, could provide crucial supporting evidence for federal officials seeking to strengthen a 33-year-old roof strength standard that many safety advocates say is far too weak to protect U.S. motorists, particularly as rollover-prone SUVs and pickups proliferate.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which published the study this month, said it plans to propose tougher roof strength requirements by year’s end. The conclusions support earlier NHTSA research that found a link between crushed roofs and deaths.

“We want to make sure what we propose has a basis in reality,” said Rae Tyson, NHTSA spokesman. “This indicates the direction we are contemplating has some scientific research behind it.”

General Motors Corp. spokesman Chris Preuss said company experts would have to review the study before issuing any statement. But Preuss said roof strength was not the most important factor in reducing fatalities in rollover crashes.

“We know unquestionably through statistics that most rollover deaths and injuries occur when unbelted occupants are ejected from the vehicle,” Preuss said. “The seat belt is the first and best safety device in securing the occupant and preventing injury.”

Disputes expected

Rollover crashes are one of the leading causes of death on U.S. highways. In newly released data, NHTSA said 10,376 Americans died in rollover crashes in 2003 about one-third of all passenger-vehicle highway deaths.

And each year, an estimated 7,000 people are killed or severely injured in rollovers in which the roof crushed, according to federal statistics.

Automakers are expected to oppose any sweeping changes to the roof-strength requirements for cars and trucks, which could add cost and weight to millions of vehicles.

The companies currently are fighting hundreds of lawsuits in courtrooms around the country arising from rollover accidents, leaving them potentially liable for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. In June, Ford lost a record $368 million verdict in a San Diego rollover case involving a crushed roof on an Explorer SUV.

NHTSA officials have been reviewing the latest research since early this year. It was published on the Department of Transportation’s Web site earlier this month.

In the new study, NHTSA researchers examined 273 severe rollover crashes between 1997 and 2000. The cases were culled from NHTSA’s National Automotive Sampling System, a cross-section of crashes meant to be statistically representative of all U.S. crashes.

In one important conclusion, NHTSA found there was a clear statistical correlation between the amount a roof intruded into the passenger compartment and the severity of injury. In cases where occupants weren’t injured, the vehicles averaged 16 centimeters of lost headroom due to roof intrusion. In accidents with the most severe injuries, the vehicles lost lost an average of 24 centimeters of headroom in the rollover crashes.

“This just reinforces our view that improvements to the roof-crush standard are necessary,” said Henry Jasny, general counsel for Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety, a Washington safety watchdog group.

Tougher test

In 1971, GM and Ford Motor Co. led an industrywide effort to persuade federal officials to adopt a minimum standard for roof strength but only after their vehicle fleets failed the government’s first proposed test, according to internal corporate documents examined by The Detroit News.

Furthermore, automakers over the years have fought potential upgrades to the roof-strength standard, even while their own European operations build and test stronger roofs.

The new NHTSA study indicates that the agency is leaning toward toughening the roof-strength test, known as Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 216. NHTSA said damage patterns produced by the existing test do not match what its researchers found in real-world crashes. But by increasing the force applied to the test, the agency did produce results similar to those in the crash files.

In the 216 test, one side of the roof must support one and a half times the unloaded weight of the vehicle. For cars, the test applies a maximum of 5,000 pounds of force.

To address the proliferation of bigger trucks and SUVs, NHTSA attempted in 1989 to apply the regulation to vehicles weighing up to 10,000 pounds. But the Big Three lobbied against it and NHTSA gave in, agreeing only to test vehicles that weigh 6,000 pounds or less. In effect, the heaviest trucks and SUVs, mainstream products like the Dodge Durango, Lincoln Navigator and Chevy Tahoe, are technically exempt from the 216 test.

Safety advocates want NHTSA to design a much tougher test, a crash test similar to what vehicles undergo in actual rollovers. NHTSA researchers say they have not been able to devise a crash test that produces the same results every time, a legal requirement for any new safety standard.

Donald Friedman, a former GM engineer and roof strength expert who has testified on behalf of dozens of plaintiffs in product liability cases, said NHTSA should be looking to devise a test that mimics real-world rollovers rather than strengthening the existing test.

NHTSA to push updates

The agency’s findings are important in justifying any call for stronger roofs. Automakers argue that most injuries in accidents where passengers stay in the vehicle during a rollover are caused by occupants flying out of their seats and into the roof. Industry researchers say the government has not proved that stronger roofs would help reduce injuries and fatalities.

But NHTSA’s new study contradicts auto industry-sponsored research that has cast doubt on the safety benefits of stronger roofs.

NHTSA’s Tyson cautioned that improving roof strength alone would prevent only a fraction of rollover fatalities. The agency is expected to combine new requirements in roof strength with requirements for improved safety belts and other ways to reduce head injuries to save more lives.

“There is no regulation that will ever be 100 percent effective,” Tyson said.

NHTSA is expected to issue a proposal for new roof-strength requirements later this year. The proposed regulation will be reviewed by the Department of Transportation and the White House before being made public.

Safety advocates welcomed the study, saying it is another hurdle that the agency must clear before proceeding to its long-anticipated rule-making push.

“This tells us where NHTSA is going,” said Sean Kane, head of Safety Research & Strategies, a Massachusetts firm that has carefully tracked the government’s safety research. “The agency is setting the foundation for its upcoming rule-making.”
]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/8639 Mon, 12 Apr 2004 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/8639
Noyes pulled his Ford F-150 SuperCab pickup left to pass. But an oncoming car was approaching fast.

He cut back sharply to the right. The pickups wheels skidded into a low guardrail. Then, the 4,600-pound truck flipped on its side, and rolled over several times before coming to rest in a shallow culvert on the edge of a cornfield.

And when a Lancaster County sheriffs deputy got to the accident scene at 7:06 p.m. last July 11, Noyes was dead in the drivers seat, his lap-and-shoulder belt buckled and the roof of the F-150s cab crumpled down over his head.

It was a split-second traffic maneuver that turned disastrous, one of nearly 7,000 deaths and serious injuries linked each year to crushed vehicle roofs.

But Noyes death is also a chilling example of how seat-belted motorists are killed or injured when their vehicles roofs crush around them.

An average of 3,700 deaths and serious injuries occur annually in rollover accidents in which the victims are belted and the roof is crushed, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

No subset of rollover statistics is under greater scrutiny by NHTSA, which is expected this year to propose a tougher new roof-strength standard to replace the current rule enacted back in 1971.

The biggest increase in rollover deaths is coming from belted occupants, said Sean Kane of the research firm Strategic Safety. It is the key correlation between roof-crush and injury severity.

For more than 30 years, Detroits Big Three automakers have maintained that crushed roofs do not cause fatal or catastrophic injuries, but simply reflect the violent circumstances of certain rollover accidents.

But that explanation provides little solace to the Noyes family.

Accidents can happen, but Ray didnt have to die, said his widow, Sally Noyes.

Ray Noyes, 65, was an American success story an Eagle Scout, a U.S. Navy chief petty officer, nuclear-plant engineer, youth wrestling coach, husband, father and grandfather.

He died on a rural road hed traveled countless times, a ruler-straight stretch of two-lane blacktop cutting through the farms and pastures of southeastern Nebraska.

But it could have been any rollover anywhere: a momentary loss of control, a vehicle upended, a roof crushed and a life lost.

Ray Noyes had more than 200,000 miles on his old-model Toyota pickup when he finally decided to buy a new truck.

And like any project he took on, Noyes analyzed it in detail.

Ray was an engineer, a nuclear engineer, said his stepson Mitch Krenk. He researched everything to death.

Born in 1937 in the tiny Nebraska town of Imperial, Noyes was a self-made man with a tireless work ethic. He joined the Navy at age 19, spent 10 years on active duty, and returned to earn degrees in mechanical and nuclear engineering.

A stocky, crew-cut former wrestler, Noyes had a lifelong love of machinery. On our first date, he took me to Brownville (Neb.) to see the big hole in the ground for the Cooper nuclear plant, Sally Noyes said.

Ray was a hardware man, said Larry Harrold, his longtime supervisor at the Energy Northwest public utility in Richland, Wash. He had a nose for staying on top of problems and coming up with solutions.

Methodical and meticulous, Noyes poured over product specifications of pickup trucks in the spring of 2000. For an engineer whose favorite book was Why Materials Fail, selecting a new truck was no small deal.

Wed stop at a store and hed be down on his knees looking at tires, said his son Chuck Noyes. He just really thought things through.

Noyes settled on a bright red, 2000 Ford F-Series SuperCab with leather captain chairs, 17-inch cast-aluminum wheels, and a special towing package. When he retired from Energy Northwest, Noyes packed up his Ford and moved his family back to their roots in Nebraska.

But he was never far from a toolbox, tinkering in the garage and building a home office exactly like the chiefs quarters on a naval warship. Mostly, Noyes enjoyed the fruits of retirement spending time with old pals, hunting at his cabin in Wyoming, and cheering on his grandsons at sporting events.

It wasnt hard to pick his booming baritone out of a crowd at a high-school basketball game.

Every time my son made a basket, Ray would jump up and yell, All right! Krenk said. I finally told him he didnt have to cheer during warm-ups.

Red lights flashing

On Friday nights, things get lively at the Veterans Of Foreign Wars Post 4959 in Crete, Neb. While the vets kick back and swap stories, their wives cook up a spread of ribs and side dishes for supper.

Ray and Sally Noyes came early for Grill Menu night at the VFW last July 11, bringing along Sallys 90-year-old mother, Alice Weiss. After they ate, Sally headed off to a meeting for her 50th class reunion of Crete High School.

Noyes took his mother-in-law home, then started east on Highway 33 for the 20-minute trip back to Lincoln.

The weather was clear and warm. The speed limit was 55 mph. Noyes was halfway home when it happened.

He saw the car stopped in front of him and reacted. If he had lost control just up the road, his F-150 might never have rolled.

Except he hit the only guardrail for miles. The F-150s right wheels dug into the rails three metal cables, and the truck rolled over onto its right side, according to the police report.

The passenger side took the first blow, but the roof on the drivers side bore the brunt of the crash.

On impact, the roof over Noyes crushed down at least 10 inches, nearly to the back of his seat. The roof on the other side hardly was deformed.

Lancaster County Sheriffs Deputy Derek Horalek witnessed the rollover from down the road, and was on the scene almost instantly. Noyes, he said in his accident report, was wearing his lap-and-shoulder belt.

Noyes was taken to Bryan Lincoln General Hospital West, where he was pronounced dead on arrival. The certificate of death lists cardiac arrest and trauma from MVA (motor vehicle accident) as the causes.

Later that evening, Sally Noyes rode down Highway 33 with her sister, and passed the flashing red lights of police cars on the shoulder of the road.

I said, There must have been an accident, she said. It looks like a red pickup. It never dawned on us.

She arrived home to find the front door locked and the house dark. When she got inside, the phone was ringing. There had been, she was told, an accident on Highway 33.

Crash-test findings

When he saw his fathers F-150 at the storage yard, Chuck Noyes was shocked at the damage on the drivers side roof.

The roof looked like a crinkled aluminum can, just crushed on one side, Chuck Noyes said. It was like a karate chop just chopped it. The passenger door opened up fine.

Auto-safety experts agree that no two rollover accidents are identical, and that trucks roll differently than passenger cars.

But certain characteristics appear frequently in rollover conditions.

The leading side of the roll very often suffers less damage than the trailing side of the vehicle. If a car or truck rolls to the right, the left side of the roof crushes with more force.

And the trailing side where Ray Noyes sat is where the worst injuries occur.

In a 1994 study of 58 rollover accidents, former General Motors Corp. engineer Don Friedman cataloged where injuries occurred in relation to the leading side of the vehicle.

Nearly 85 percent of the deaths and severe injuries happened on the trailing side, and the majority of those victims wore seat belts.

Friedman recently expanded the study to 800 rollovers from 1992 to 1998, and found that 90 percent of deaths and injuries occurred on the trailing side.

Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 216, which is under review by NHTSA, only requires automakers to test one side of the roof.

Pressure equal to 1.5-times the vehicles weight is applied gradually. If the roof crushes five inches or less into the passenger compartment, it passes 216.

Safety advocates contend that testing one side, particularly with the windshield intact, fails to show how the second side will perform in a rollover.

The roof has got to be able to withstand what is a predictable and serious problem with these vehicles, said R. David Pittle, senior vice president of technical policy and advocacy for Consumers Union.

Detroits Big Three automakers for decades have argued that crushed roofs have nothing to do with serious injuries in rollovers. Instead, they say injuries are caused by occupants diving into the roof before it collapses.

Ford Motor Co. has declined interview requests from The News on the topic of roof strength. But Fords position on the issue is clearly spelled out in government documents.

In a 2001 filing with NHTSA, Ford said crash data suggesting the presence of roof deformation and occupant injury does not establish a causal connection between the two.

Moreover, Ford rejects the notion that rule 216 needs updating after more than 30 years.

There is no added benefit to occupant safety with increased overall roof strength, the company said.

But safety experts say the growing percentage of belted rollover victims seems linked to the strength of the roof or lack of it.

Ten years ago, 16 percent of the people injured in rollovers were belted, said Ken Digges, a professor with the National Crash Analysis Center at George Washington University.

Now NHTSA estimates that belted occupants represent 55 percent of deaths and injuries in roof-crush, rollover cases.

As the percentage of belted occupants rises, said Digges, roof crush becomes more important.

The metal A-pillars that frame the windshield are critical to the strength of a vehicles roof. On Noyes truck, the A-pillar on the left side was nearly flattened. The roof itself came down directly over the drivers seat.

Noyes was a formidable man, a 6-foot-2, former University of Nebraska heavyweight wrestler in robust good health. His lap-and-shoulder belt held him in his seat right in the path of the crushed metal roof.

The greater the roof crush, the higher the likelihood of head injuries, Digges said.

We have studied two levels of roof intrusion ... five inches and 10 inches, he said. We found that the higher level had more frequent head impacts.

Family takes action

Did the roof of his F-150 kill Ray Noyes?

There was massive blunt head trauma, which can cause brain-stem separation, said Timothy Eves, a lawyer for the Noyes family.

A wrongful-death lawsuit against Ford will be filed within weeks, Eves said. Sally Noyes struggled with her decision to sue, but felt a lawsuit would help expose the problem of crushed roofs

You have to get their attention and their attention is lawsuits, she said. Im thinking of other people. How many more will this happen to?

The family cant accept that a hard-core engineer bought a brand-new, top-of-the-line truck that couldnt protect him in a rollover.

How often did he buy a new vehicle? Only twice in a lifetime, said his stepdaughter Carrie Vitullo. It makes you mad. I think about it every time I see a Ford truck on the highway.

Noyes chose the Ford F-150 only after looking at every comparable pickup on the market.

Ray thought he was buying the best, toughest truck out there, Krenk said. Most people buy a full-size pickup because its tough. You know, its Ford tough.

After the accident, Krenk and Chuck Noyes went to the scene and picked Noyes tools out of the high grass. His two sisters, Barbara and Josephine, found his billfold. When they came back, they were shaking, Krenk said.

At his funeral, a video tribute was shown to a soundtrack of his favorite singer, Willie Nelson. There was Ray hunting in the mountains, celebrating with friends and family, posing proudly in his Navy uniform.

Each year, an average of 253,000 vehicles roll over in the U.S. More than 26,000 people are killed or seriously injured. In 6,900 cases, there was roof-crush present in the vehicle. And in 3,700 instances, the victims were belted.

Ray Noyes was one of them. ]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/8640 Mon, 12 Apr 2004 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/8640
One case, however, stands out from the rest.

In December 2002, a Duval County, Texas, jury found that a crushed roof caused the side doors of a 2000-model SuperCab to burst open, ejecting Paul Alaniz and Laura Benavides to their deaths from the rolling pickup.

The verdict is believed to be the first time that a jury linked roof deformation to occupant ejection in a rollover accident.

Detroits Big Three automakers have long maintained that ejection is an entirely separate issue from the growing debate over federal standards governing roof strength.

But in Benavides v. Ford, the jury ruled that a crushed roof forced open the drivers door and the rear-hinged passenger door on the same side.

It was clearly a survivable accident if the doors had stayed closed, said the attorney for the Alaniz family.

Ford declined interview requests. In court, the automakers lawyers argued that the driver, Paul Alaniz, was solely at fault because he consumed alcohol on the evening of the accident, then lost control of his F-150 on a two-lane highway about 75 miles southwest of Corpus Christi.

The jury didnt agree, and awarded the Alaniz and Benavides families a combined $225 million one of the biggest automotive product-liability judgments on record.

Ford chose not to appeal the case and, instead, negotiated a confidential settlement, Wigington said.

A critical piece of evidence introduced at trial was a four-minute video of an F-150 SuperCab ejected off a moving dolly at about 45 miles per hour.

Ford commissioned an outside firm to do the test, primarily to show the jury how severe the accident was that killed Alaniz and Benavides.

Instead, the plaintiffs attorneys offered the video into evidence.

In the dolly-rollover test, the SuperCabs doors popped open on the drivers side, and test dummies were partially ejected from the vehicle.

Because of its barn-door style center-opening doors, the SuperCab has no B-pillars supporting the roof in the center of the truck.

Door latches failed

At the Benavides trial, former Ford engineer John Stilson, testified that latches fastening the front and rear drivers side doors failed because the roof caved in.

On the second roll, the drivers door latch failed because of the manner in which the roof crushed, said Stilson, testifying on behalf of the plaintiffs.

Each year, more than 26,000 people are killed or seriously injured in rollover accidents, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Nearly 7,000 deaths and serious injuries involve accidents where the vehicle roof crushed.

NHTSA only considers crushed roofs a factor in rollovers accidents where the occupants arent ejected. Safety experts, however, say deformed roofs do play a role in rollover ejections.

The roof-crush mode influences not only roof deformation, it can influence the risk of ejection, said Ken Digges of the National Crash Analysis Center at George Washington University, which is conducting an extensive roof crush study for NHTSA.

Crush-related ejections are usually tied to windshields or windows breaking in a rollover, with occupants ejected out the opening, said former General Motors Corp. engineer Donald Friedman, a frequent plaintiffs witness in roof crush lawsuits.

High rollover rate faulted

Critics claim the Ford F-150 SuperCab appears to have an abnormally high rate of ejections in rollovers. (The lawsuits against the SuperCab predate Fords redesign of its F-Series lineup for the 2004 model year.)

A total of 134 people were fatally ejected from F-Series SuperCabs from 1998 to 2001, according to a Ford internal document introduced at the Benavides trial.

The CrewCab version of the F-Series, which has four conventional doors with front hinges, accounted for 71 fatal ejections during the same period.

Even if an occupant is not ejected, the lack of B-pillars in the SuperCab weakens the overall roof structure, said the plaintiffs attorney.

Everyone, including everyone at Ford, knows the roof structure on these trucks simply will not protect people in rollover accidents, Watts said after a Texas jury awarded $18 million to Mario Castro, who was paralyzed in a SuperCab rollover.

In the Benavides trial, Ford lawyer Rosewell Page III said the SuperCabs roof exceeded Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 216 by 43 percent. The vehicle was reasonably safe, he said.

But the circumstances of the accident convinced the jury otherwise.

On the evening of July 20, 2001, Paul Alaniz, 35, drove to a club in Kingsville, Texas, with three friends: Laura Benavides, 20; Juan Flores, 26; and Eluterio Elizondo, 24.

Alaniz, a physical-education teacher and youth football coach, drank at least two beers during the night out, according to trial testimony. His blood-alcohol level was 0.04 percent, half of the legal limit in Texas.

On the return trip, Alaniz drove with Benavides seated behind him. Flores and Elizondo were in the front and rear seats on the passenger side.

About 2:30 a.m., Alaniz lost control of the F-150. The truck tipped on the passenger side, and rolled three times off State Highway 2285, according to court records.

The roof on the drivers side the trailing side in the rollover was crushed severely. Both doors on the drivers side came open. Alaniz and Benavides were ejected an estimated 100 feet into a field of sagebrush and cactus.

Seat belts not used

But the doors on the passenger side stayed closed. Both Flores and Elizondo stayed in the vehicle and were uninjured.

None of the four were wearing seat belts.

The two on the side where the roof crushed and the doors popped open, they died, said Tony Alaniz, Pauls younger brother. The two on the right side where the doors stayed closed, they lived.

Page, Fords lawyer, blamed Paul Alaniz for the wreck.

If Mr. Alaniz had not lost control of this vehicle, there would be no accident and there would be no death, Page said.

The wreck, he said, was a violent accident.

Accidents happen every day, Page said in court. People die on the highway.

Tony Alaniz said his older brother was hardly a reckless driver.

He never had a speeding ticket in his life, never had a single citation for anything, he said. He didnt fall asleep. He went off the road, overcorrected, and the truck rolled over.

He wears a gold chain that he took off his brothers body at the accident scene nearly three years ago. Last month, Tony Alaniz visited the site, marked by two white, wooden crosses on the roadside.

Its just something thats so hard to accept, he said. You know, I had that same truck. Paul liked it so much he bought one just like it.

He sold his SuperCab after the accident, and now drives a four-door sedan. ]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/8641 Sun, 11 Apr 2004 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/articles/read/8641
When it finally stopped, she tried to move. I was thinking get out, I had to get out, she said. I thought I was getting out.

But the Nebraska woman was paralyzed, her spinal cord crushed on impact with the metal roof that caved in around her.

Its the hidden risk in any rollover accident, whether the roof stays intact or collapses with catastrophic results.

Each year, an estimated 7,000 people are killed or severely injured in rollovers in which the roof crushed, according to federal statistics.

Yet Detroits Big Three automakers, armed with political muscle and reams of research, have fought costly upgrades to a 33-year-old roof-strength standard, even while their own European operations build and test stronger roofs.

General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. essentially drafted the regulation as it stands.

In 1971, the automakers led an industrywide effort to convince federal officials to adopt a minimum standard for roof strength but only after their vehicle fleets failed the governments first proposed test, according to internal corporate documents examined by The Detroit News.

The industry wanted something that will allow our vehicles to pass, Peter Bertelson, who headed Fords crash-test programs in the late 1960s, told The News.

Critics say the industry-backed test, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 216, is too weak to save lives, particularly as rollover-prone SUVs and pickups proliferate.

Now the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, under pressure from safety advocates and Congress, says its finally time to fix rule 216 and plans to propose a tougher standard later this year.

The stakes for automakers are enormous. Changes in roof structures could add cost and weight to millions of vehicles.

Its been known for quite some time that this is a standard that needs updating, NHTSA Chief Dr. Jeffrey Runge told The News.

His opinion is hardly shared by members of the Big Three.

There is no correlation between roof strength and the likelihood of injury in a rollover crash, said Robert Lange, GMs executive director for vehicle structure and safety integration.

That position seems incomprehensible to Shipler, a quadriplegic since her accident seven years ago.

If they dont think the roof matters, let them live a full day as a quad and see what it entails, said Shipler, 36, who won an $18.6 million lawsuit against GM last year.

Juries in Texas, California and Nebraska have repeatedly rejected Big Three-backed studies that deny a link between crushed roofs and injuries.

With huge judgments coming in, including a $225 million verdict against Ford in a roof crush case, safety groups have stepped up their campaign for a new roof-strength standard.

We think the auto manufacturers basic claim is not true, said Gerald Donaldson, director of the consumer group Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety. Roof strength is absolutely critical.

NHTSA is looking hard at recent crash data to establish a direct relationship between collapsing roofs and catastrophic injuries.

In filings with NHTSA, GM, Ford and DaimlerChrysler contend there is no need for new standards.

But it is an industry divided, with the Big Threes own European operations Opel, Saab, Volvo, Mercedes-Benz performing rollover tests that far exceed the 216 standard.

NHTSA publishes safety ratings based on frontal- and side-impact crash tests, but consumers dont know how their vehicles roof will react to a rollover until it happens.

And it can occur in an instant, such as when Patrick Parker hit a deer and rolled his Ford F-250 pickup in northern Texas, and ended up a quadriplegic.

People have been telling NHTSA that 216 is inadequate for years, and they have done nothing, said Dena Parker, Patricks wife. How many more people have to die or end up like Patrick?

NHTSA backs down

The consequences of crushed roofs were clear to federal regulators as early as 1969.

Approximately 1,400 motor vehicle occupants were killed in that year by impact with roof structure in rollover accidents, the National Highway Safety Bureau, NHTSAs predecessor, said in 1971.

Engineers in Detroit grappled with their own analyses of rollover accident data. An internal study by Fords Automotive Safety Research Office dated July 8, 1968 reached some very basic conclusions.

People are injured by roof collapse, the Ford study said. The total number of nationwide deaths and injuries cannot be estimated but it is a significant number.

With the government considering its first roof-strength standard, GM and Ford conducted their own tests rolling cars over on ramps, dropping them upside down, loading pressure on the A-pillars that frame the windshield.

A series of inverted drop tests at Ford produced startling results, said Bertelson, the former manager of Fords Impact Dynamics Department.

We dropped 40 or 42 different cars on their roofs in 1968, said Bertelson, now retired and living in Arizona. The engineers who worked for me were just shocked. The roof strength was terrible.

At the urging of GM and Ford, federal regulators proposed a static test that applied specific pressure to both A-pillars. But on Jan. 8, 1971, five of six GM vehicles failed the test, according to documents on file in the Shipler case.

Two months later, Fords Working Safety Committee reported that current 1971-72 vehicles will not meet the requirements of the notice.

Ford put a price tag on passing the governments initial test. All car lines, as currently programmed, would require new A-pillars at a cost of $9 to $15 per car, Fords Safety and Emissions Programs Group said in a document dated March 22, 1971.

GM, Ford and Chrysler protested the two-pillar test. Ford questioned whether crushed roofs even posed a danger a direct contradiction of its own 1968 study.

The data do not implicate top intrusion as an automotive safety problem, Ford said in its April 5, 1971, comments to the agency.

NHTSA relented, reducing the load angles of the pressure test and limiting it to just one side of the vehicle.

But the agency did not back down from its original premise.

For non-ejected front seat occupants in rollover accidents, NHTSA said, serious injuries are more frequent when the roof collapses.

Trucks, SUVs at risk

When rule 216 went into effect in 1973, passenger cars outnumbered light trucks almost 5 to 1. But with the explosive growth of SUVs and pickups, light trucks make up more than half of all new vehicles sold today.

And with more trucks come more rollovers.

In the 216 test, one side of the roof must support one and a half times the unloaded weight of the vehicle. For cars, there is a 5,000-pound limit.

To address the onslaught of bigger trucks, NHTSA attempted in 1989 to apply the regulation to vehicles weighing up to 10,000 pounds. But the Big Three lobbied against it and NHTSA gave in, agreeing only to a 6,000-pound limit.

In effect, the heaviest trucks and SUVs, mainstream products like the Dodge Durango, Lincoln Navigator and Chevy Tahoe, are technically exempt from the 216 test.

Safety experts contend that automakers routinely design down to meet the bare-minimum requirements of 216.

Some manufacturers take weight out to reduce their strength-to-weight ratios down closer to the minimum, said Steve Forrest, senior engineer of the firm Safety Analysis and Forensic Engineering, which advises plaintiffs in lawsuits against automakers.

In 1999, Ford twice reduced the thickness of the steel in the A-pillars of its heavy-duty F-series pickups, according to internal documents subpoenaed in Patrick Parkers 2002 lawsuit against Ford.

The savings, the documents said, totaled $2.42 per truck.

The F-250 pickup that Patrick Parker was driving is one of the heaviest trucks on the market and not covered by rule 216.

What is the rationale in thinking if its heavier that it doesnt have to meet the standard? said Dena Parker. Its just crazy.

Ford declined interview requests on rule 216, referring inquiries to the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, a Washington-based industry trade group.

But the alliance, which also represents GM, DaimlerChrysler and other automakers, has little to say publicly.

We are conducting field research on roof strength, and it would be inappropriate to comment before we have collected or analyzed the data, said Eron Shosteck, an alliance spokesman.

DaimlerChrysler issued a brief statement on 216: Chrysler Group tests its vehicles beyond the requirements of the federal standard.

At GM, Lange said roof strength is one of many variables considered in designing a new car or truck.

We manage very deliberately the overall mass of the vehicle and its body structure, he said.

European manufacturers, including GMs Saab and Opel units, employ high-strength steel to improve the strength of roofs. But concerns about extra weight and cost preclude using stronger steel in mass-market domestic vehicles.

We try to provide safety performance without burdening consumers with added costs, Lange said.

He said GM does use high-strength steel in the United States when appropriate, but would not identify specific models. One is the 2004 Cadillac SRX, a luxury SUV that a GM product brochure says has extra steel to provide superior occupant protection.

Safety cages with stronger roofs have been common for years in European brands such as Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Volkswagen and Volvo. To test roof strength, prototypes are rolled off a moving dolly to simulate actual accident conditions.

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers rejects so-called dynamic rollover tests, calling them hopelessly unrepeatable. Yet dynamic tests designed to simulate real-world crashes are routine for European brands.

Why test beyond the minimum standard of 216?

If you look at Volvos history in safety, our target has always been to overachieve, said Hans Wikman, project manager for Volvos XC90 sport utility vehicle.

Human impact

Rule 216 has been under study by NHTSA since the early 1990s, but the path to a new roof-strength standard has taken a tortuous route.

While roof-strength has been on NHTSAs agenda for years, the agency has focused on other priorities such as air bags, child safety seats, and frontal- and side-impact standards.

An official public comment period on 216 has dragged on for 28 months, yielding thousands of pages of documents submitted from both sides of the issue.

NHTSA Chief Runge pledges to propose a new standard this year, but could be hamstrung by a battle in Congress over tying new safety rules to sweeping federal highway legislation.

Theres some distrust there because NHTSA has waited so long to upgrade 216, said Sean Kane, whose consulting firm, Strategic Safety, works with plaintiffs lawyers. But its an industry problem, and its getting worse.

Bertelson, who has testified in several lawsuits, looks back on Fords early roof-strength tests and questions why a federal safety standard written in the 1970s is still on the books.

Its long overdue, he said. This has been on my conscience for 30 years.

A mothers struggle

And in a tiny tract house on the outskirts of Lincoln, Neb., Penny Shipler wonders what her life would be like today if not for the accident that ravaged her spinal cord on the night of Sept. 11, 1997.

A single mother who waitressed at a local restaurant, Shipler accepted a ride home from work that night from a friend, Kenneth Long, in his 1996 Chevy S-10 Blazer.

Just before midnight, Long lost control of the SUV on a deserted stretch of highway.

The vehicle rolled at least four times, according to court testimony. The roof on the drivers side suffered marginal damage, and Long walked away from the wreck.

But the roof crushed down 8 inches on the passenger side. When police arrived at the scene, Shipler was hanging upside down, paralyzed from the neck down, her lap-and-shoulder belt still buckled.

Shipler sued GM and Long. Last September, after a five-week trial, a Lancaster County jury awarded Shipler $19.5 million in damages, a figure later reduced by the judge to $18.6 million.

GM is appealing the verdict. During the trial, the automaker argued that no roof would have stayed intact during such a violent accident. But the jury rejected the defense.

I felt GM was guilty, said juror Deena Douglas.

The roof is like an eggshell. Youre in a tank with an eggshell on top of your head, which is the most important part of your body. I dont get it.

The appeal process could drag on for two years, said, Shiplers attorney. For now, Shipler and her 6-year-old son, Keenan, subsist on about $800 a month in Social Security and disability checks.

She can move her arms, but has no feeling in her torso and lower body. Confined to a motorized wheelchair too big to fit through her bathroom door, Shipler counts on the help of her little boy to make it through each day.

A life-care specialist testified at her trial that Shipler will need at least $10 million worth of medical care and assistance in the future.

People say, Oh my God, you got $20 million, she said. Its not much fun, I dont think, to be a millionaire and be a quad.

On a snowy February afternoon, Shipler waited outside her home for a city bus to take her to the bank, a journey that takes her six hours to complete.

She tries not to be bitter that the deformed roof of an SUV sentenced her to a life of paralysis.

Of course you get angry, but you cant spend your life angry, she said. If (GM) does admit guilt or responsibility, theres a lot theyre going to have to change.

But it all seems unreal to her, how an obscure, decades-old federal safety rule still stands after thousands of injuries and deaths in rollover accidents where roofs crushed.

Their point right now is to worry about the cost of what its going to take to change the vehicle, she said. Well, look at the cost of what happens after the vehicle crashes. ]]> http://www.yourlawyer.com/topics/overview/vehicle_roof_caving Sun, 11 Apr 2004 00:00:00 -0700 http://www.yourlawyer.com/topics/overview/vehicle_roof_caving Vehicle Roof Caving According to federal statistics, approximately 7,000 people each year are killed or severely injured in vehicle accidents in which the roof crushes or caves in. Detroit’s top automakers, armed with political muscle and reams of research, have fought costly upgrades to a 33-year-old roof-strength standard, even while their own European operations build and test stronger roofs. General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. essentially drafted the regulation as it stands.

In 1971, the automakers led an industry wide effort to convince federal officials to adopt a minimum standard for roof strength, but only after their vehicle fleets failed the government’s first proposed test, according to internal corporate documents examined by The Detroit News. “It’s been known for quite some time that this is a standard that needs updating,” NHTSA Chief Dr. Jeffrey Runge told The News.

Juries in Texas, California and Nebraska have repeatedly rejected Big Three-backed studies that deny a link between crushed roofs and injuries. Safety groups have stepped up their campaign for a new roof-strength standard with new verdicts that have come in, including a $225 million verdict against Ford in a roof crush case.

The NHTSA is looking hard at recent crash data to establish a direct relationship between collapsing roofs and catastrophic injuries. In filings with NHTSA, GM, Ford and DaimlerChrysler contend there is no need for new standards. NHTSA publishes safety ratings based on frontal and side-impact crash tests, but consumers don’t know how their vehicle’s roof will react until it literally occurs.

“Some manufacturers take weight out to reduce their strength-to-weight ratios down closer to the minimum,” said Steve Forrest, senior engineer of the firm Safety Analysis and Forensic Engineering, which advises plaintiffs in lawsuits against automakers. European manufacturers, including GM’s Saab and Opel units, employ high-strength steel to improve the strength of roofs.

If you or a loved one has been injured as a result of your vehicle's roof caving in, please fill out the form at the right for a free lawsuit case evaluation by a qualified product liability attorney.]]>