What will the Auto Industry tolerate?

At the bottom of the article below is a list of reasonable proposals that would strengthen NHTSA and work to protect consumers from the egregious conduct witnessed recently, whether it's TOYOTA'S FAILURE TO CORRECT SUDDEN UNINTENDED ACCELERATION, GM's ignition switch failures, TAKATA EXPLODING AIRBAGS.

Will the Do-Nothing Congress pass anything sensible?

Will the Auto Industry tolerate reasonable oversight?

Is NHTSA nominee up to the task?

Rosekind first must prove himself to Congress

Mark Rosekind faces a confirmation hearing with lawmakers who have demanded reforms.

By Ryan Beene

Automotive NewsNovember 30, 2014 - 12:01 am ET

WASHINGTON -- As an expert on human fatigue, Mark Rosekind is well-suited to steer the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration toward the era of autonomous driving and connected-car technologies.

But in the near term, Rosekind will have to prove to members of Congress that he is up to the task of revitalizing an agency beset by lapses exposed in the General Motors ignition switch and Takata airbag scandals.

Rosekind will need to address "how to restore the public's trust in America's auto safety watchdog ... the need to implement the cultural change that's needed at the agency" and how it can keep up with the fast-changing auto industry, said Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., who heads the Senate Commerce Committee's consumer-protection panel.

Rosekind, who was appointed last month to head NHTSA, faces a Senate confirmation process that begins Wednesday and will put him face to face with several lawmakers who have been harshly critical of the agency and demanded reform. NHTSA has been without a Senate-confirmed administrator since January, when David Strickland stepped down and left his deputy, David Friedman, to serve as NHTSA's public face.

McCaskill: How to restore trust

The senators who will pass judgment on Rosekind have proposed several bills that would boost NHTSA's funding and enforcement powers, and they are likely to demand a commensurate level of responsiveness and accountability on the part of the regulator.

A lack of agency resources has been a recurring theme of congressional hearings into the GM and Takata recalls. NHTSA allocates just $10 million a year to its roughly 50 staffers who investigate defects in automobiles, buses, commercial vehicles, heavy-duty trucks and child car seats. By comparison, GM alone hired 35 safety investigators this year to beef up its defect investigation department, on top of the staff it already had, CEO Mary Barra told a U.S. House committee in June.

"NHTSA and Dr. Rosekind will face serious challenges and must do a better job discerning danger in cases like those involving GM ignition switches and Takata airbags, which imperiled drivers long after NHTSA had reason to act," Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said in a statement. "At NHTSA, regulatory capture has created a failure to ask tough questions and has needlessly put lives at risk," he added, referring to the close relationship between the agency and the industry it regulates.
Since 2010, Rosekind has been a member of the National Transportation Safety Board, which investigates major transportation accidents. He was a NASA official in the 1990s, where he led a program to evaluate and prevent the effects of pilot fatigue, and he founded a fatigue-management firm after leaving the agency.

At NHTSA, Rosekind must overcome his limited experience with the auto industry and with running a large organization.

"Given the GM ignition switch and now Takata, I would have expected someone with more of a hands-on experience in vehicle safety," Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, told Reuters.

But some of NHTSA's outspoken critics were pleased with Rose-kind's nomination. Joan Claybrook, NHTSA's administrator under President Jimmy Carter, called Rosekind "an excellent choice."

"He understands regulation and law enforcement, both of which are critical as the leader of NHTSA," she said. "And he recognizes that regulators are not necessarily popular no matter what they do."

On the docket

 

Lawmakers have introduced several bills this year to improve compliance with and enforcement of federal auto safety laws.
• Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 2014*
Sponsor: Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif.
Requires more automaker disclosures about fatal accidents and greater public access to safety reports, increases NHTSA funding for vehicle safety programs, boosts maximum agency fine to $200 million
• Early Warning Reporting System Improvement Act
Sponsor: Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass.
Requires more automaker disclosures about fatal accidents and greater public access to safety reports, requires NHTSA to upgrade its online databases and provide public notice of all defect investigations
• Motor Vehicle and Highway Safety Enhancement Act
Sponsor: Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.
Doubles funding for NHTSA's vehicle safety operations over 6 years, raises or eliminates caps on NHTSA fines for violations, gives federal prosecutors more freedom to pursue criminal charges against safety-law violators
• Whistleblower bill
Sponsor: Sen. John Thune, R-S.D.
Provides cash incentives to encourage industry employees to alert officials about faulty products
• Hide No Harm Act
Sponsor: Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.
Makes it a crime, punishable by fines and prison time, for an executive to knowingly conceal corporate actions that pose risk of death or serious injury

*Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., introduced a similar bill in the Senate.

 

 

 

http://www.autonews.com/article/20141130/OEM11/312019965/is-nhtsa-nominee-up-to-the-task

 

 

4 Year Old Lily Quintus was killed when an OUT-OF-CONTROL TOYOTA SOLARA struck her Day Care....

VIDEO ON LINK

Posted: 4:48 p.m. Friday, Nov. 21, 2014

Defense team scores win in fatal KinderCare hit-and-run case

Related

Photos: Scene from KinderCare crash

Photos: Damage to SUV in day care crash

Raw: Medics help injured children in KinderCare crash

View Larger

Robert Corchado court appearance

 

 

WINTER PARK, Fla. —

Channel 9 learned on Friday that a man accused in a hit-and-run crash that caused another vehicle to slam into a Winter Park day care, killing a 4-year-old girl inside, has won a legal battle in the case.

Robert Corchado is behind bars without bond, facing several felony charges related to the case.

Chanel 9's Jeff Deal found some evidence against him, however, won't be allowed at trial.

State troopers said Corchado caused the April crash that sent another car into the KinderCare on Goldenrod Road.

Lily Quintas, who was inside at that time of the crash, died from her injuries.

This week, Corchado's defense team got a victory with a court ruling that keeps evidence from a prior crash out of the case.

In December, Corchado was arrested in a similar crash near a day care in Seminole County.

Investigators found a large amount of drugs and cash in the car.
Prosecutors hoped to present evidence from that crash in the KinderCare hit-and-run trial.

"The state has to show Corchado knew there was either death or injury involved in the accident," said WFTV legal analyst Bill Sheaffer

The state argued the prior crash could help show that.

Even though the crashes may sound similar, Sheaffer said the court decided the other case really wouldn't help show either way whether Corchado knew there were injuries or death when he allegedly left the scene.




http://www.wftv.com/news/news/local/defense-team-scores-win-fatal-kindercare-crash-hit/njCxr/

 

Inside Takata, tantrums, but little sense of crisis over air bags

SEE:

Akiko Takada, CEO's mother, reported to be dominant person in Takata


Stephanie Erdman was injured by an EXPLODING TAKADA AIRBAG:

 

Hien Thi Tran was killed by an EXPLODING TAKADA AIRBAG:

Inside Takata, tantrums, but little sense of crisis over air bags

ByReuters

Published:   30 November 2014

By Norihiko Shirouzu

TOKYO, Nov 30 (Reuters) - Shigehisa Takada, the third-generation head of Takata Corp, shows little sense of the crisis engulfing the Japanese air bag maker at the centre of one of the auto industry's biggest safety recalls, according to three people who have met him recently.

Just days before a Nov. 21 U.S. congressional hearing on defective Takata air bags that have been linked to at least five deaths, Takada told business associates he was personally dealing with the quality issues, and his company had identified and fixed the main cause of the defect - which he said was mainly a flawed manufacturing process, the people said.

He told them that Takata had significantly improved its air bag propellant chemistry for bags it is using to replace defective ones, and the company now just has to step up and replace all suspect air bags as quickly as possible.

"He acts like this recall is going to blow by in due time and harbours little sense of crisis," said one of the associates, none of whom wanted to be named given the sensitive nature of their comments.

More than 16 million vehicles have been recalled worldwide since 2008 over Takata's air bag inflators, which can explode with too much force and spray metal fragments into the car.


LOW PROFILE

Takata's handling of the massive safety recall has frustrated U.S. politicians and regulators and has confused drivers as to whether their cars need fixing or not.

Takada, the Tokyo-based company's 48-year-old chairman and CEO, apologised at the annual shareholders' meeting in late-June, which was closed to the media, but has otherwise not been seen in public.

"He's a nice man, very sincere and seemingly capable, but he doesn't view this as a crisis spiralling out of control," said another of the business associates.

The scale of the recalls looks certain to escalate after U.S. safety regulators ordered Takata last Wednesday to expand piecemeal regional recalls of driver-side air bags to cover the entire United States, not just hot and humid areas where the inflators are thought to become more volatile.

Takada did not explain to the business associates exactly what Takata had done to improve the propellant chemistry and manufacturing process, and they said he should be explaining these changes publicly.

They said his reluctance or inability to do so may in part be due to the influence his 74-year-old mother retains at Takata, which was founded by his grandfather more than 80 years ago as a textile mill.

Shigehisa joined the family firm straight from university, became president in 2007, aged 41, and moved to the top executive post after the death in 2011 of his father, Juichiro, who built Takata into Japan's leading auto safety manufacturer.

Juichiro, known in the U.S. as "Jim Takada", was a rolled-up sleeves executive who donned a hard hat on site visits and once was spotted down on his hands and knees checking a faulty machine in a noisy textile plant in South Carolina, recalled a former colleague of the current CEO.

His son, he added, is very different - "painfully shy, bookish and into computers ... very good with statistics."

"BIG WIFE"

His mother Akiko, a former Takata executive, now heads the non-profit Takata Foundation, but remains vocal as a special adviser to the company. Some managers call her "O-okusan", or "big wife", underscoring her influence, while Shigehisa is referred to as "the son", or "Shige-chan" - a familiar, short form of his name with a suffix normally reserved for children.

"In a business situation, she could be very forceful and tries to impose her way in just about every way possible," said one of Shigehisa's business associates who has worked with Akiko on a project. Two of the three associates recalled how she once engaged in a tit-for-tat negative campaign with a rival.

"Imagine being her son and trying to exercise leadership with her buzzing around you," the person said. "He's paralyzed to make decisions on his own."

Takada is also under pressure from big automaker clients such as Honda Motor and Toyota Motor which try to control and influence how Takata deals with the recalls, two of the business associates said. Also, external legal advisers hired in the United States have focused on minimizing potential court damage rather than on repairing a battered public image.

The business associates said the lawyers restrict what Takada and other executives say and do publicly.

"Takata management's ability is not hindered by any forces from within the company or from outside," spokesman Toyohiro Hishikawa said in response to Reuters queries for this article.

In response to criticism that Takata's leadership has not been more visible, Hishikawa said: "That doesn't rule out the possibility of our top management team explaining our stance on and response to the recalls more publicly in the future."

Takata, which has around 43,000 employees globally, has seen its market value slump almost 60 percent this year to just above $900 million.

In one recent incident, Shigehisa went "missing for a few hours" from Takata's Tokyo headquarters after a row with his mother, said one person familiar with the matter.

"He was yelled at by his mother and went missing. Nobody knows where he went.

He came back after a few hours," the person said. (Additional reporting by Paul Lienert in Detroit and Antoni Slodkowski in Tokyo; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-2854791/Inside-Takata-tantrums-little-sense-crisis-air-bags.html#ixzz3KYbr0WeB
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

Airbag maker faces its 'dangerous bridge'

Airbag maker faces its 'dangerous bridge'     





Kwan Weng Kin | The Straits Times | Sunday, Nov 30, 2014

When Mr Juichiro Takada, the late president of car safety systems maker Takata Corp, heard that his company might be roped in to mass-produce airbags, his first reaction was that it was "too dangerous a bridge to cross".

Honda engineer Saburo Kobayashi, who was in charge of airbag development at the carmaker, recalled in his memoirs that in 1985 Mr Takada said he wanted to withdraw from the airbag development project.

As airbags must be made to a high degree of reliability, Mr Takada felt the business was too risky for his company, which had made its name as a seat belt maker.

"If something should happen due to any airbag component, Takata would collapse. I cannot cross such a dangerous bridge," he told the engineer.

As it turned out, Takata did not leave the project, and Mr Takada finally agreed to build an airbag plant in Japan. Thanks largely to Honda, more than half of whose cars are equipped with Takata airbags, Takata clinched 20 per cent of the global airbag market, becoming the world's second-largest maker, behind only Sweden's Autoliv. But the "dangerous bridge" that Mr Takada was afraid to cross in 1985 has finally caught up with the company, now run by his son, Mr Shigehisa Takada, who is chairman and chief executive.


Over the years, rapid expansion in demand led Takata to move airbag production overseas.

Unfortunately, lapses in quality control at two plants in the United States and Mexico resulted in deaths from exploding metal parts - prompting a massive recall that has so far hit 7.8 million cars in the US alone.

With the American safety authorities having already ordered a nationwide recall, and recalls in other countries also likely, the total figure could exceed 10 million.

At the end of September, Takata held cash assets of 83.3 billion yen (S$918 million) and boasted an equity ratio of 30.9 per cent. But it is expected to have to write off billions of yen in view of the recall, which could leave it about 25 billion yen in the red by March next year, at the end of its current fiscal year.

Mr Shigehisa Takada has vowed in a statement that his company is "committed to the highest standards of safety".

Last year, in an apparent bid to restore the company's reputation, Takata appointed Swiss national Stefan Stocker as president and chief operating officer - the first time that a non-member of the founding family took the helm.

Mr Stocker is no token foreigner. He is fluent in Japanese, having studied in Japan in the early 1980s, and he headed auto parts maker Bosch's operations there from 2002 to 2009.

However, Takata's top management has not appeared in public to address the media directly regarding the airbag problem.

"It is incomprehensible why Takata's top management has not held any press conferences or briefings to explain the situation in their own words," said business daily Nikkei in an editorial.

"When a company is facing a crisis, the company's fate is influenced by how top management behaves," the daily added. Takata's stock ended trading yesterday at 1,292 yen on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, down 4.79 per cent from the previous day's close.

Fortunately for Takata, it is not possible for carmakers to suddenly switch suppliers of their airbags, which are designed to match the characteristics of each car model.

Honda remains Takata's biggest client, owns 1.2 per cent of its stock and is one of its largest shareholders. Takata has 56 plants in 20 countries, including Singapore, and employs 43,680 workers.


 - See more at: http://transport.asiaone.com/news/general/story/airbag-maker-faces-its-dangerous-bridge#sthash.q583nkIm.dpuf

Government in Bed With the Bed Bugs?

 

Automobiles

N.H.T.S.A. Deepens Investigation of Honda Accord Air Bags

By CHRISTOPHER JENSEN

 

 

N.H.T.S.A. has received numerous complaints from the owners of 2003-8 Honda Accords that side curtain air bags deployed when a door was slammed or while driving, although the cars were not involved in crashes.Credit American Honda

Federal regulators have intensified an investigation into the inadvertent deployment of side air bags on 2008 Honda Accords. The action comes as owners of Accords from the 2003-4 and 2008 model years face a deadline next month to file claims in a class-action suit over a similar problem.

 

The investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration covers about 335,000 Accords from the 2008 model year. Regulators are concerned that the side air bags along the outer edges of the ceiling and the seats may deploy when a door is slammed, according to a report posted on the safety agency’s website. The air bags are designed to protect an occupant’s head and chest in a side impact. Honda began installing those systems for the 2003 model year, and by 2008 was equipping every Honda except the S2000 convertible with the system, the automaker said.

 

The agency began its investigation in January, based on complaints from owners. Late last month, federal regulators said they were intensifying the investigation after receiving reports of 293 cases of the side air bags deploying when a door was slammed shut. Fourteen injuries were reported, the severity of which was not noted.

 

“My fiancé closed the door,” one owner wrote in October in a report to the agency. “Loud boom and my son starts screaming, crying. I realize once the powdery smoke clears that the air bags entire side curtain and passenger front seat have gone off thus hitting my 9-year-old in the head. Honda is denying it is their fault. Now I have an injured child and the car with about $7,000 damage.”

The inadvertent deployment of side air bags is also the issue in a class-action lawsuit filed in 2009 in a federal district court in California. The suit covers some 2008 Accords, as well as 2003-4 models, and claims that the side-impact air bags are defective because they deploy without an accident, including while the vehicle is moving. The suit also says that Honda told owners, incorrectly, that there is no defect and that the automaker refuses to reimburse customers for repairs that typically cost $3,000 to $6,000.

 

This November, Jack Zouhary, a judge with the United States District Court for the Central District of California, will consider giving final approval to settlement. He gave tentative approval in January, and owners were sent letters this year. They have until Sept. 2 to file a form seeking compensation for past air-bag deployments.

 

While Honda agreed to the settlement, it did not admit there was a defect.

 

According to the terms of the settlement, owners of Accords from the 2003-4 and 2008 model years will be reimbursed for the cost of repairs if they already have already experienced an inadvertent deployment and previously complained to Honda or an authorized dealer. There will also be a two-year warranty for future air-bag deployments for all 2008 owners, but not the owners of the 2003-4 models.

 

“I think it was just a compromise and a recognition of the age of the car,” Mike Arias, one of the plaintiffs’ lawyers, said in a telephone interview.

 

Owners of the 2008 Accords would get a better deal if the N.H.T.S.A. investigation led to a recall. Honda would be required to fix all of the air bags, not just reimburse car owners whose air bags had deployed. The government also has the authority to require an automaker to reimburse an owner for a previous repair.

 

The settlement does not cover 2005-7 Accords.

 

“Honda made changes to its collision detection systems, which appear to have addressed the inadvertent deployment issue,” Mr. Arias wrote in an email. The numbers of deployments for those years “were extremely low.”

 

According to the agency consumer complaint database, there were 24 complaints from owners of 2005-7 Accords about inadvertent deployments of the side air bags while the vehicles were moving.

 

“I was driving on the interstate with the flow of traffic, approximately 60 miles per hour, when there was a sudden explosion and smoke filled the inside of my Honda Accord,” the owner of a 2007 model wrote in a report to the agency late in 2012. “The air bags had deployed for no apparent reason.”

 

Clarence Ditlow, the executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, said in a telephone interview that there was no excuse for not covering the 2005-7 models.

 

“If there is less of a problem with the intermediate years, then there are fewer claims that are paid out,” he said. “So why not cover them?” He added that the owners of 2003-4 models should have the same two-year extended warranty as the owners of the 2008 models.

 

Chris Martin, a Honda spokesman, wrote in an email, “I can’t add anything further regarding the process that went into the settlement. We normally don’t provide detailed comment on pending litigation.”

 

Under the tentative settlement, the three law firms that filed the suit could receive up to $1.2 million in fees and expenses. Mr. Arias said the firms invested more than $1.5 million into the case and would be losing money.

 

In response to the federal investigation of the 2008 models, Honda has denied there is a safety problem, saying in a report that “more times than not the person who is slamming the door is the person who has vacated the seat in the vehicle. As a result, the seat is unoccupied and therefore the deployment poses no risk to that seating position.”

 

Honda has had other problems with air bags recently. One was an issue with front air bags made by the Takata Corporation that were built with an inflator that could explode and shower the passenger compartment with metal fragments. Since late in 2008, Honda has recalled about 8.9 million vehicles worldwide for that problem, Mr. Martin wrote in an email. Honda also said that there were two deaths linked to the defect in the United States.

 

The auto industry this year has recalled a record number of vehicles for various safety problems, including millions recalled for air bag-related issues.

 

Correction: August 21, 2014
An earlier version of this article misstated the government’s authority over payments for previously performed repairs. It is not the case that federal regulators cannot require an automaker to reimburse an owner; they can.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/19/automobiles/nhtsa-deepens-investigation-of-honda-accord-air-bags.html?_r=1

KinderCare case blames other driver

On the right of the screen [of ROUTE 44 TOYOTA SOLD ME A LEMON] is a search feature.

Click on Lily Quintus, KinderCare, Toyota Solara for additional information related to the article below.

This little charmer, Lily Quintus was killed when a RUNAWAY TOYOTA SOLARA struck her day care.

After Mr. Corchado struck the TOYOTA SOLARA, evidence indicates that the TOYOTA SOLARA WILDLY ACCELERATED, leaving skid marks that photos indicate were measured.

This seems similar to a TOYOTA ACCIDENT that killed this nice lady, Noriko Uno....

...this is her RUN-AWAY TOYOTA....

This young man, Koua Fong Lee was sent to prison after his RUNAWAY TOYOTA killed 3 people while TOYOTA sat by....[see A ROAD TO FREEDOM].....

WHAT OTHER VEHICLE WILDLY ACCELERATES AFTER BEING STRUCK?

HOW DOES THIS MAKE SENSE?

Judge: KinderCare crash jury won't hear about earlier drug case

By Jeff Weiner, Orlando Sentinel

 

 

When Robert Corchado goes to trial in the April hit-and-run crash at Goldenrod Road KinderCare, prosecutors won't be able to tell his jury about another crash months earlier involving illegal drugs, a judge ruled this week.

 

Corchado, 29, faces several felonies, including leaving the scene of a fatal accident and heroin trafficking, in connection with the crash at the Orange County day care April 9.

The case is currently set for trial Dec. 1.

Robert Corchado booking mug. April 10, 2014.

 

Prosecutors say Corchado rear-ended a Toyota Solara on Goldenrod Road. The car's driver lost control and drove into the day care, injuring a dozen children, including 4-year-old Lily Quintus, who died at a local hospital.

Authorities say Corchado abandoned the sport utility vehicle he was driving at a nearby house, leaving behind packages of heroin, cocaine and marijuana in the vehicle as he scrambled to evade a region-wide manhunt.

Prosecutors in the day care crash had hoped to use evidence from an earlier collision in the upcoming trial: In December, Seminole County deputies say Corchado crashed into a parked vehicle in a car full of drugs.

 

 

The state has to prove that Corchado knew, or should have known, that the day care crash had caused serious injury or death when he fled, and argued the Seminole County crash would help with that element of the case.

The reason: In the December crash, Corchado is suspected of trying to ditch the drugs before deputies arrived.

In the KinderCare crash, he left the illicit materials behind for authorities to find — because he was so "freaked out" by the chaos he'd just caused at the day care, prosecutor Ryan Williams argued in a recent hearing.

Lily Quintus, 4, was killed in the April 9, 2014, crash at Goldenrod Road KinderCare. (Quintus family)

In an order this week, Circuit Judge Greg Tynan rejected that argument. He said the state's theory of why Corchado left the drugs behind is "too tenuous" to link the two cases sufficiently "to make such evidence relevant."

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/breaking-news/os-robert-corchado-day-care-crash-ruling-20141121-story.html

US Agency Threatens To Act Against Air Bag Maker

Florida Woman Injured By Shrapnel From Takata Airbag

US Agency Threatens To Act Against Air Bag Maker

November 26, 2014

 

The airbag unit for the passenger seat of a Toyota Motor Corp. vehicle is seen at the company’s showroom in Tokyo, Japan, on Thursday, April 11, 2013. Takata Corp. faces its biggest recall crisis in almost two decades after defective airbag inflators led Toyota Motor Corp., Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. to call back more than 3 million vehicles. (Source: Koichi Kamoshida/Bloomberg via Getty Images)


DETROIT (CBSMiami/AP) — U.S. safety regulators have threatened airbag maker Takata Corp. with fines and legal action, if they do not admit the driver’s air bag inflators are defective and agree to a nationwide recall.

In a letter to Takata’s Washington office, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gave the Japanese company until Tuesday to file paperwork declaring a defect and expanding the recall from high-humidity states to the full nation.

The company’s air bags have been blamed for at least five deaths and multiple injuries worldwide. They can inflate with too much force, blowing apart a mental canister and spewing shrapnel.

READ: Florida Woman Injured By Shrapnel From Takata Airbag

The letter is the first step in a legal process to compel a nationwide recall. To do so, the agency must determine that there’s a safety defect and hold a public hearing. Then it can go to court. It can also fine the company up to $7,000 per vehicle with defective inflators, and NHTSA says there are millions on the road today.

“Be assured that we will use all of our authority and resources,” Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said in a statement.

Takata has maintained that the air bag problems are caused by prolonged exposure to airborne moisture, and that there’s no need for a national recall. Moisture can make the chemical propellant in the air bags burn too fast. Boundaries of the recall zone vary by manufacturer, but generally it covers Gulf Coast states, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and some U.S. territories.

A company spokesman was working on a response Wednesday.

In the letter, NHTSA says Takata hasn’t safety defect papers as demanded by the agency Nov. 18.

The company, the letter said, has not explained why two driver’s side air bag inflators ruptured outside the high-humidity areas.

“Despite the severe consequences of air bag ruptures and mounting data demonstrating a safety defect, Takata responded that it did not agree with NHTSA’s basis for a nationwide recall,” the letter stated.

The agency cites inflator ruptures that injured drivers in California and North Carolina as justification for the national recall.

About 8 million vehicles from 10 manufacturers have been recalled in the U.S., and 14 million worldwide. The vehicles have Takata driver or passenger air bags, or both. So far the government is not seeking a national recall of passenger air bags, saying that data doesn’t support it outside of high-humidity areas.

NHTSA also is moving to get automakers to agree to minimum boundaries for the passenger air bag recalls in high-humidity areas with average dew points of 60 degrees or higher.

Its first target was Chrysler. In a letter Tuesday, NHTSA told the company to expand its recall and accused it of moving too slowly to notify car owners. The company says it’s working on a response.

Chrysler is recalling more than 371,000 older vehicles in Florida, Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. But NHTSA says the passenger air bags can malfunction in a wider area that adds southern Georgia; areas along the Gulf Coast in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas; and Guam, Saipan and American Samoa.

Other automakers with smaller recall zones will be asked to take similar action.

NHTSA demanded that Chrysler start notifying owners of the recall starting no later than Monday. In response, Chrysler said it would move notification from Dec. 19 to Dec. 8. The company also said a committee will consider expanding the recall on Monday.

Recently NHTSA has gotten tough with Takata on the air bag issue, but lawmakers have criticized the agency for a slow and haphazard response.



http://miami.cbslocal.com/2014/11/26/us-agency-threatens-to-act-against-air-bag-maker/#comments




 

Toyota share price down, launches a global recall due to Takata related safety concerns

November 27, 2014 2:23 pm

 

 

 

 

Toyota Motor Corp said it has launched a global vehicle recall in order to change the potentially dangerous air bags produced by Takata Corp.

 

The Japanese car manufacturer said it would pull back around 57 000 vehicles equipped with Takata-made airbags, as safety issues related to ruptured air bag inflators are far from over.

 

Since 2008 more than 16 million vehicles have been recalled due to the faulty air bag inflator, which may explode and burst metal fragments into the car. Last week Honda Motor Co also launched a car recall over the same problem.

 

Toyota said it has no knowledge of any injuries or deaths linked to the recall, which includes its Vitz cars, also known as Yaris in some markets, and RAV4 crossover models made between December 2002 and March 2004. Around 40 000 of the recalled vehicles are in Japan, 6 000 in Europe and the remaining 11 000 are located outside of North America.

 

Daihatsu Motor Co, a subsidiary of Toyota, also launched a recall in Japan, including 27 571 Mira cars constructed between December 2002 and May 2003 for the same reason. According to Japan’s transport ministry official around 2.6 million vehicles have been pulled back due to concerns over air bag safety.

 

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has given Takata until December 2 to launch a recall that finds a defect in the “driver’s side air-bag inflators and is nationwide in scope.” If the company does not comply, the NHTSA may force a recall and issue civil fines of up to $7 000 per violation.

 

“Takata has provided no justification for limiting the geographic scope to the high absolute humidity region” said Frank Boris, head of NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation.

 

Shintaro Niimura analyst at Nomura Credit Research, said that US recall driver-side costs could go up to ¥70 billion, he also warned that Takata could need almost ¥200 billion of reserves in the event of a US nationwide recall that includes passenger-side air bags.

 

“If the company makes any missteps, we cannot say that there is ‘zero’ chance of the company dying a sudden death – that is, being hit with excessive debt or facing a cash-insolvency bankruptcy” Mr. Niimura said.

 

Toyota Motor Corp lost 0.46% on Wednesday and closed at ¥7 147 in Tokyo, marking a one-year increase of 13.09%. The company is valued at ¥24.54 trillion. According to the Financial Times, the 25 analysts offering 12-month price targets for Toyota Motor Corp have a median target of ¥8 200, with a high estimate of ¥9 400 and a low estimate of ¥7 000. The median estimate represents a 14.73% increase from the last price of ¥7 147.

http://www.binarytribune.com/2014/11/27/toyota-share-price-down-launches-a-global-recall-due-to-takata-related-safety-concerns/

Fatal TOYOTA Crash

Woman killed in Route 287 car accident in Wanaque
November 27, 2014

By Jim Norman and John Seasly
staff writers The Record

Buy this photo

Tariq Zehawi

Fatal car accident killed one woman on Route 287 southbound in Haskell.

WANAQUE — A Kinnelon woman driving south on Route 287 was killed Thursday when her car was struck by an SUV near the Ringwood Avenue exit, state police said.

Jennifer Pechko, 43, was backing her white Toyota convertible up on the shoulder around 7 a.m., lost control of it, and it swung around into the traffic lanes of the interstate highway. A sport utility vehicle with four people in it smashed into the passenger side of the convertible, slamming it into the left-lane barrier of the highway, police said.

Pechko was declared dead at the scene and the four people in the SUV were treated for minor injuries, police said.

The left and center lanes of the southbound side of the highway were closed for several hours while the wreckage was cleared.



http://www.northjersey.com/news/woman-killed-in-route-287-car-accident-in-wanaque-1.1142730

AFTER THE NEWS CYCLE: TOYOTA expands TAKATA AIRBAG RECALL

PLEASE NOTE: THERE IS A GREAT DEAL OF INFORMATION COMING OUT AFTER THE NEWS CYCLE DURING A LONG HOLIDAY WEEKEND WHEN THE AMERICAN PUBLIC WON'T NOTICE!


THIS ARTICLE IS PARTICULARLY WORRISOME:

Japanese Secrecy & Cover-Up: REFUSE to IDENTIFY MAKE WITH EXPLODING TAKATA AIRBAG!

The air bag from a 2003 car ruptured during testing of devices from scrapped vehicles in Gifu prefecture, Masato Sahashi, a ministry official, told reporters today at a briefing in Tokyo. The Nov. 6 incident may result in a recall once the reason for the malfunction is determined, Sahashi said, declining to name the automaker or model.

In the article below, it appears that this is the model referred to...WHY THE SECRECY?:

A Toyota spokesman said the scrapped car was a 2003 Will Cypha, a Japan-only compact model that is no longer in production.

Toyota recalls more cars for dangerous Takata air bags

By Chang-Ran Kim and Mari Saito

TOKYO Thu Nov 27, 2014

 

 

A security guard walks under the logo of Toyota Motor Corp at the company's showroom in Tokyo June 17, 2014.

Credit: Reuters/Yuya Shino

Reuters) - Toyota Motor Corp said on Thursday it would recall 57,000 vehicles globally to replace potentially deadly air bags made by Takata Corp, as a safety crisis around the Japanese auto parts maker looks far from being contained.

Toyota's action follows a recall by rival Honda Motor Co for the same problem two weeks ago after revelations of a fifth death, in Malaysia, linked to Takata's air bag inflator. More than 16 million vehicles have been recalled worldwide since 2008 over Takata's air bag inflators, which can explode with too much force and spray metal fragments into the car.

Toyota is recalling some Vitz subcompacts, called Yaris in some markets, and RAV4 crossover models made between December 2002 and March 2004. About 40,000 are in Japan, 6,000 in Europe and the rest in other markets outside North America. Toyota said it was not aware of any injury or death related to the recall.

Separately, Toyota's small-car subsidiary Daihatsu Motor Co also issued a recall, in Japan, of 27,571 Mira minivehicles produced between December 2002 and May 2003 for the same reason - its first recall involving Takata inflators.

About 2.6 million vehicles have been recalled in Japan so far for Takata's air bag inflators, a transport ministry official said.

Takata-related recalls are almost certain to balloon after U.S. safety regulators on Wednesday ordered the company to expand a regional recall of driver-side air bags to cover the entire United States, not just hot and humid areas where the air bag inflators are thought to become more volatile.

Takata has so far resisted expanding the recall, saying that could divert replacement parts away from the high-humidity regions that need them most.





TUESDAY DEADLINE

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has given Takata until Tuesday to issue a nationwide recall, and could fine it up to $7,000 per vehicle if it doesn't comply. It remains unclear how many more vehicles that would add, but it could be in the millions, affecting five automakers: Ford Motor Co, Honda, Chrysler Group LLC, Mazda Motor Corp and BMW AG.

A U.S.-wide recall of driver-side air bags could cost an estimated 70 billion yen ($600 million), Nomura Credit Research analyst Shintaro Niimura wrote in a Nov. 26 report.

"Takata could need nearly 200 billion yen ($1.7 billion) of reserves in the event of a U.S. nationwide recall (including passenger-side air bags), and the company's cash-on-hand would be tightly squeezed," he wrote, noting Takata had just 8.33 billion yen of cash and deposits.

"If the company makes any missteps, we cannot say that there is 'zero' chance of the company dying a sudden death - that is, being hit with excessive debt or facing a cash-insolvency bankruptcy," Niimura added.



SHARES HIT

*****************

NHTSA's action and the latest recalls come on the heels of an announcement by Japan's transport ministry on Wednesday that it received a report of an "unusual deployment" of a Takata air bag as it was being removed from a scrapped car on Nov. 6. The inflator was manufactured in January 2003 at Takata's Monclova, Mexico factory, and had not been subject to recalls, at least in Japan, raising the prospect of an expanded recall, the ministry said.

A Toyota spokesman said the scrapped car was a 2003 Will Cypha, a Japan-only compact model that is no longer in production. Toyota said it was investigating the issue as part of its wider probe into Takata's air bag inflators. "We will take prompt and appropriate action if we find there is a need for a recall as a result of the investigation," it said.

Takata shares dropped as much as 7.9 percent in Tokyo on Thursday, closing down 4.8 percent. Toyota shares eased 0.5 percent and Daihatsu shares slipped 1.2 percent, roughly in line with the broader market. Shares of Honda, Takata's top customer, underperformed other auto stocks, falling 3.3 percent.

Honda had said the Takata air bag inflator that failed in the Malaysia crash had likely been exposed to excessive moisture at the supplier's now-shuttered plant in LaGrange, Georgia. A transport ministry official said no further recalls are expected in Japan related to the problem identified at the LaGrange line between November 2001 and November 2003.

A second U.S. congressional hearing is scheduled for Wednesday, where representatives from Takata, NHTSA and several automakers will testify.

($1 = 117.3600 yen)



(Reporting by Chang-Ran Kim; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

FROM:

GM Recall Survivors

Originally Published: November 26, 2014 8:34 AM
Modified: November 26, 2014 5:10 PM

GM ordered to produce ex-CEO Wagoner's 2009 performance review

Linda Sandler

Wagoner

 

 

 

NEW YORK -- A U.S. judge told General Motors to give customers any portions of former CEO Rick Wagoner’s 2009 performance evaluation that relate to recalls and ignition-switch issues.

Wagoner may have watched a presentation showing stalling by the Chevrolet Cobalt about three weeks before he was fired by the Obama administration in March 2009, GM’s paid investigator, Anton Valukas, has said. That finding was the first indication a CEO at the company had any knowledge of faults in the Cobalt’s ignition switch.

The order signed Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Jesse Furman in Manhattan was made on the condition that GM finds the review document after a “reasonable” search.

Personnel files for 32 current and former GM employees were demanded by customers in a $10 billion car-price lawsuit against GM in Furman’s court and by the family of an accident victim suing in a Georgia state court. They’re trying to strengthen their case that GM hid a known flaw for at least a decade.

GM, which says it’s now focused on safety issues, will also turn over four years of performance ratings tied to pay for 26 people, including Ray DeGiorgio, the engineer in charge of the defective switch, and Mike Robinson, vice president of global regulatory affairs.

Highest ranking

Robinson was the highest-ranking executive GM fired around the time Valukas published his June report, according to a person familiar with the matter.

“GM will comply with the court’s decision and provide the appropriate documents,” the company said in a statement Wednesday.

Mary Barra, who became CEO in January after more than 30 years at GM, has said she didn’t learn about company investigations into Cobalts until December 2013, and Valukas backed those statements. She said she learned about the stalling and switch recall in January, a month before it began.

GM is also required to dig up separation agreements and disciplinary letters that might illuminate its handling of the switch.

The carmaker won the right to limit to the switch issue what it shows the customers. Lawyers in the $10 billion group suit wanted to see complete performance reviews, saying they would “provide valuable insight into GM’s troublesome corporate culture, where cost control was placed above safety.”

Findings disputed

In a letter to Furman, the lawyers disputed Valukas’s findings on Barra, saying documents they got earlier from GM indicate she knew about the recall two months before making it public.

E-mails marked “urgent” from GM to supplier Delphi Automotive ordered 500,000 switches for Chevrolet Cobalts and other small cars by Dec. 18, according to communications made public by the lawyers.

The $2.6 million Delphi order was small for GM. In an average week, it orders about $40 million of parts from suppliers, Alan Adler, a GM spokesman, said.

Barra was in transition at the time. Formerly GM’s product chief, she was named on Dec. 10 to succeed the retiring Dan Akerson as CEO and took over on Jan. 15.

Delay sought

Separately, GM asked Furman to put off taking customers’ arguments in support of their suit until a bankruptcy judge decides whether they have a right to demand money from the carmaker.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Gerber ruled in the company’s 2009 reorganization that it can’t be sued for its predecessor’s errors. The customers are pressing to go ahead, saying Gerber can’t free GM from its own mistakes.

The automaker said in a filing Tuesday that most of the customers are claiming compensation for cars made by so-called old GM, the pre-bankruptcy entity. Only nine out of 68 sets of named plaintiffs across seven states “definitively assert that they purchased vehicles manufactured by New GM,” the company told Furman.


http://www.autonews.com/article/20141126/OEM02/311269955?template=mobile

 

Devin Xu, 47, died from head injuries sustained "as a result of the deployment of an air bag," citing a "metallic portion" that hit him in the face as it deployed

Lawsuit Filed in Death of Man Due to Faulty Air Bag

By Hetty Chang

 

VIDEO ON LINK

 

 

A grieving Southern California family has filed a lawsuit, blaming a faulty air bag for their loved one’s death. Hetty Chang reports from Alhambra for the NBC4 News at 11 on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014.

 

Wednesday, Nov 26, 2014

 

The lawyer for a family of a SoCal man suing air bag maker Takata said he is certain he'd be alive today had his air bag deployed properly.

 

According to the lawsuit and the medical examiner's report obtained by NBC4, Devin Xu, 47, died from head injuries sustained "as a result of the deployment of an air bag," citing a "metallic portion" that hit him in the face as it deployed.

• UpdatedUrgent Air Bag Warning: Updated List of Cars That Should Be Fixed

•  

"It's the type of thing that air bags are designed to protect against," said attorney Gary Dordick, who hopes Xu's lawsuit adds to mounting pressure for a nationwide recall on vehicles with air bags made by Japan's Takata Corporation.

 

Xu's family is suing Honda and Takata for punitive damages.

 

 

On Monday, Honda admitted it failed to report more than 1,7000 injury and death claims about its vehicles to U.S. safety regulators, a violation of federal law.

 

On Sept. 3, 2013 Xu was leaving the parking lot of an Alhambra restaurant where he worked as a chef. A medical issue caused him to lose control of his car and strike several cars before hitting a wall, Dordick said.

 

 

The impact caused Xu's air bag to deploy and explode, causing metal particles to strike him, ultimately resulting in his death, Dordick said.

 

Due to the nature of Xu's injuries, police who responded to his death initially thought they were dealing with a homicide, which is similar to what happened in at least one of five other deaths reportedly linked to faulty Takata air bags.

 

"They come out with an explosion with such force that the injuries are being misidentified as gunshot wounds," Dordick said of the sharp objects spewing out of the air bags, hitting passengers in the face.

 

"My client lost her husband. The children lost their father. They'll never be able to pick those pieces up again," he said.

 

Xu's 2002 Acura is one of hundreds of car models representing as many as 8 million cars named in the current international Takata recall.

 

The company has limited its recall in the U.S. to the Gulf region because it believes humidity is part of the problem.

 

A statement translated from Japanese to English on Takata's website refers to the investigation into a fatal accident that occurred in Malaysia in July 2014:

 

"The moisture absorption control of the gas generating agent in some driver seat air bags had not been correctly implemented at the time of manufacture, as a result of which an inflater canister may rupture when the air bag deploys."

 

"There's no moisture problem in California," said Dordick. "How many people have to get hurt? How many people have to die before they do the right thing?"

 

The lawsuit was filed the same day Takata executives testified before a Senate committee apologizing to the families of those who may have been impacted.

 

Auto industry experts have been watching Takata's actions closely. At least one expert warned of the unintended consequences.

 

"I'm seeing people posting on forums instructions on how to disable an air bag because they're worried," said Todd Turner, president of Car Concepts. "It's the worst thing you can possibly do."

 

Turner does not condone Takata's actions, but urged consumers to take a look at the bigger picture.

 

"You're looking at almost 50 million cars a year that are being sold in the world. Most of those have air bags in them," he said. "(In) most cases they work."

 

"We have information as early as 2005 (that) they knew about this problem," Dordick said. "They knew people were getting hurt and killed — so why eight years later is my client's husband and father killed for the same problem?"

 

 

 

http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Lawsuit-Filed-in-Death-of-Man-Due-to-Faulty-Airbag-283928861.html