Posted on 03/09/2010 2:16:17 PM PST by JoeProBono
Toyota Motor Corp. said Tuesday that the Prius involved in a highly publicized acceleration incident on a California freeway along with hundreds of thousands of others will be recalled to prevent floor mats from pinning down the gas pedal.
But the recall hasn't been issued because Toyota "hasn't developed the remedy yet," said Toyota spokesman Brian Lyons.
In November, Toyota recalled several models including the Toyota Camry and Avalon sedans and the Lexus ES sedan to reshape the floor and gas pedals to prevent unsecured or ill-fitting floor mats from entrapping the pedal in an open position.
As part of those recalls, Toyota said Prius hybrids from the 2004 to 2009 model years would be recalled in the future to address the same issue.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
All true statements. However, his autopsy revealed that epilepsy was not to blame.
I didn’t know that. I wasn’t aware they could even determine one way or the other whether he had a recent seizure since he died from drowning (as did the other passengers).
I guess the cause still remains unknown.
btt
6. To what extent do we know that this whole thing isn’t one part mass hysteria and one part witch hunt?
You may be right. This is the article I read which lead me to believe that epilepsy was ruled out:
http://cbs11tv.com/local/southlake.toyota.crash.2.1471874.html
“And an autopsy released today said there was no evidence he had a seizure before the crash.”
No evidence does not necessarily mean it didn’t happen.
You are correct, this was the incident I was getting confused with.
However, it doesn’t mean he did have a seizure either.
There have been at least a couple of incidents caught on 911 tape where it’s pretty clear that the floor mats aren’t the problem.
Going 75 down the Interstate is not a good place to get the “blue screen of death”. But now we know why Toyota was dragging their feet. It was the test of a fix.
Followup to the story of the guy that managed to drive a Toyota with a stuck throttle to a dealership. Wasn’t the floormats at all.
As someone else commented at the link, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if the car was currently being dissected by Hyundai to investigate what happened.
Notice that he could dial 911 and talk while supposedly panicked. Yet he claims he didn’t put the car in neutral because he “didn’t know if the car would flip”...!!!
http://www.caranddriver.com/features/09q4/how_to_deal_with_unintended_acceleration-tech_dept
Stopping these vehicles is not rocket science. A flick of the wrist would have put the car in neutral and the breaks would have easily stopped the car very quickly.
Are there problems with Toyota’s accelerators? Yes. But there is little reason for deaths or injuries.
Further, I still firmly believe that a large number of the “unintended acceleration” incidents are human-error. Stuff under/on the pedal, folks hitting the wrong pedal (I know more than one person who has done this with a resulting accident, swearing it was the gas pedal - when I have seen them both accidentally hit the gas instead of the break more than once before).
But check out that article from Car and Driver. A real eye-opener.
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