Toyota’s

Apparently, the Department of Transportation is as confused as everyone else. Testifying before a House Appropriations subcommittee on transportation this morning, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said that owners of the recalled Toyota models should stop driving their vehicles them until Toyota is able to repair them.

“My advice is [to] anyone who owns one of these vehicles, stop driving it, take it to a Toyota dealer because they believe they have the fix for it,” LaHood told the Congressional hearing.

Later today, LaHood retracted that advice, saying that it was “obviously a misstatement.” He then fell back on the Department’s official stance, which is that Toyota owners could continue to drive their vehicles unless they notice signs that that accelerator pedal is sticking.

But the question remains, if these Toyotas are too unsafe to be sold (a DOT official flew to Tokyo to order the sales suspension and recall), then aren’t they too unsafe to drive?

LaHood’s comments suggest that nobody really knows what is causing Toyotas to speed out of control or even how frequently sudden acceleration incidents occur. In the four months since the floor mat entrapment recall was announced – the one that advised Toyota owners to remove the floor mats from their vehicles — 60 incidents of runaway Toyotas have been reported, even without interference of  floor mats or sticking accelerator pedals.

As evidence mounts that something else may be causing the cars to accelerate unexpectedly, more and more questions are being raised about how Toyota handled the problem since its onset.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration began investigating reports in 2004 that the electronic throttle control in 2002-03 Camry and Lexus ES models failed to control engine speed. Subsequent investigations have been unable to reproduce the reported problems.

But reports of sudden acceleration have continued. Growing concern over the safety of some of the best-selling cars in America has prompted Congress to launch a series of inquiries and investigations, including probes of other automakers that use the same or similar throttle assemblies to determine whether they might be a common denominator in unintended acceleration reports.

House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman plans to hold a hearing next month to determine “how quickly and effectively” Toyota responded to complaints about sudden acceleration.

“Like many consumers, I am concerned by the seriousness and scope of Toyota’s recent recall announcements,” Waxman said.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Transportation secretary says people should stop driving recalled Toyotas

But what does a General Motors car have to do with the Toyota recalls?

A true hybrid in more ways than one, the Vibe is actually a spin-off of the Toyota Matrix and Corolla. Toyota actually manufactured all three vehicles at the now-defunct New United Motor Manufacturing Inc. (NUMMI) plant in Fremont, California. NUMMI was a joint venture between General Motors and Toyota that had the Japanese car maker turning out cars at what was once a General Motors plant.

General Motors pulled the plug on the Vibe and NUMMI amidst its financial crises and the wider economic challenges, but not before 99,293 of the vehicles rolled off the assembly.

Because Toyota made the Vibe for GM, the vehicle has been affected by both the floor mat entrapment recall and the sticking accelerator pedal recall.

On January 27, 2010, Toyota notified the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that it was widening its floor mat entrapment recall to include the Vibe. The 2009-2010 model year Matrix and Corolla also were included in this expansion, along with the 2008-2010 Highlander and 2009-2010 Venza.

Although GM reports no customer complaints or incidents related to the sticking pedal recall (which is separate from the floor mat entrapment recall, although many vehicles overlap between the 2 recalls), the accelerator assemblies are the same as those used in Toyota’s recalled vehicles.

General Motors will notify Vibe owners in the U.S. and Canada of the recall and available repairs. Although Pontiac no longer exists, the Vibe repairs will likely be performed by mechanics at General Motors dealerships.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota recalls include the Pontiac Vibe

Toyota issued a recall of 2.3 million cars and sport utility vehicles in January, on top of the 4.2 million vehicles it recalled in September the potential to accelerate unexpectedly — a problem Toyota says is caused by floor mat interference with the gas pedal.

The auto manufacturer then suspended sales and further production of all the models it had recalled last month, saying that the accelerator pedals could wear out and grow less responsive. The suspension included the Camry and Corolla, the second and fourth most popular cars in the U.S.

Mitch Walorski, director of relations for CTS, told ABC News that a very rare set of conditions could cause the pedals to act less responsively than normal, but that this potential wasn’t to blame for any of the unintended acceleration incidents that have caused numerous injuries and deaths.

CTS says that Toyota’s sudden acceleration problem predates its use of CTS gas pedals, and that Toyota “acknowledged that they did not cause any accidents or injuries related to that condition of the pedal.”

Safety advocates and auto experts say that Toyota still hasn’t explained why its vehicles receive more complaints of random acceleration than any other brand of vehicle. Sudden, unintended acceleration is the cause of more than 2,000 consumer complaints. It also has been cited as the cause of 815 separate crashes that have resulted in 341 injuries and 19 deaths.

“I think the bulk of the problems we’re seeing have nothing to do with some kind of accelerator pedal or with the floor mats,” safety expert Sean Kane of Massachusetts-based Safety Research & Strategies told ABC News. “It has to do with other components in these vehicles, most likely in the electronics,” he added.

Toyota angered many dealerships this week when it ordered the new gas pedal assemblies shipped to its factories and not to the dealership service departments. Some Toyota dealerships reported that anxious customers were  demanding a fix or too afraid to drive their cars.

However, Toyota announced today it would begin shipping replacement parts to dealerships.

The 30-minute repair will add a steel reinforcement bar that is designed to keep it from sticking in certain situations.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota begins repairing “sticky” gas pedals

“Why have we taken this unprecedented action?” Toyota asks in the ad. “Because it’s the right thing to do for our customers.”

However, Transportation Secretary Roy LaHood’s told Chicago radio station WGN last week that the federal government pressed the company to halt production of the vehicles.

“The reason Toyota decided to do the recall and to stop manufacturing was because we asked them to.”

Considering Toyota’s slow and reluctant response to consumer complaints, LaHood’s statement may leave loyal Toyota customers wondering whether the company would had acted at all if it weren’t for government pressure.

Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich, and his staff are set to met with Toyota officials on Wednesday.  Stupak, who leads the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, said that he is “very concerned” about the acceleration issues in Toyota vehicles.

“This unprecedented recall and the resulting halt in vehicle production and auto sales highlight the serious nature of this defect,” Stupak said in a statement.

“I applaud the action taken by Toyota and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to halt the production of models affected by sticking accelerators until Toyota can resolve the defective component or design causing this dangerous malfunction,” Stupak added.

Stupak also said that he would continue to “press for answers” in Wednesday’s meeting with Toyota executives.

“We want to find out what Toyota knows,” Stupak said.

Stupak’s comments suggest that he, like many safety advocates and Toyota customers, believe that sticking accelerator pedals and defective floor mats may not be the only defects causing so many Toyota vehicles to accelerate suddenly and unintentionally.

Beasley Allen attorney Graham Esdale, a leading investigator of Toyota’s unintended acceleration problems, says all the attention on the accelerator pedals is a distraction.

“It’s not a sticking accelerator pedal. Just like it wasn’t the floor mats. They are doing everything they can to direct attention away from the electronics.”

Esdale’s assertion is supported by other industry experts. “The way the sudden-acceleration problems are occurring in reported incidents doesn’t comport with how this sticky pedal is described,” Sean Kane, president of Safety Research & Strategies, an auto safety consulting firm told the Los Angeles Times. ”We know this recall is a red herring.”

Toyota’s recent decision to standardize a brake override system in all of its new vehicles, as well as the company’s plan to install such systems in some of the older recalled models have been explained as extra confidence-building gifts from Toyota to the consumer.

But evidence continues to mount that floor mats and accelerator pedals have nothing to do with the sudden acceleration defect.

Recent evidence turned up by ABC News supports Esdale’s claims.

Just after Christmas, four people died when the Toyota they were in sped out of control and landed upside down in a pond. Investigators found the floor mats had been removed and stashed in the trunk as the vehicle’s owners had been instructed.

Another recent incident involved a New Jersey man whose Avalon accelerated violently. Kevin Haggerty told ABC News that he managed to navigate his racing car to his dealership by shifting repeatedly between drive and neutral. When he arrived, the service manger was able to verify that the floor mat and gas pedal were not to blame.

One of Esdale’s clients was driving her Camry on an Oklahoma interstate when it began to speed out of control. The client was critically injured when her car crashed. Her friend, who was riding as a passenger, was killed in the accident.

Esdale said photos of the vehicle reveal the floor mat is properly secured and there is no evidence that the mat jammed the gas pedal.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Federal government ordered Toyota production and sales suspension

Toyota

The world’s largest car manufacturer added approximately 1.09 million to the recall list of 4.2 million vehicles that it originally announced last September. Toyota claims that the floor mats in these vehicles can become locked with the gas pedal, trapping it in an open position and causing the vehicle to accelerate unexpectedly.

The new additions to the sudden acceleration recall include the 2008-2010 Highlander, 2009-2010 Corolla, 2009-2010 Venza, 2009-2010 Matrix, and 2009-2010 Pontiac Vibe. Toyota manufactured the Vibe, modeled after the popular Toyota Matrix, for the now defunct Pontiac Brand of General Motors.

On Friday, Toyota launched a recall of eight models in Europe that include the Aygo, iQ, Auris, Corolla, Verso, Avensis, and RAV4 sports utility vehicles. Another 75,000 2009-1010 RAV4 SUVs have been recalled in China.

The European recalls encompass nearly 2 million cars and bring the total number of Toyota vehicles recalled to 9 million worldwide.

On Tuesday, Toyota announced that it had suspended production and sales of some of its bestselling models, including the 2009-2010 RAV4, 2009-2010 Corolla, 2009-2010 Matrix, 2005-2010 Avalon, 2007-2010 Camry, 2010 Highlander, 2007-2010 Tundra, and 2008-2010 Sequoia.

The suspended vehicles are the same models that Toyota recalled last week over concerns of the accelerator mechanisms wearing out and becoming stuck or unresponsive.

The manufacturer of those parts, Indiana-based CTS Corporation, has already begun supplying Toyota with new throttle assemblies. However, CTS adamantly denies that its gas pedal mechanisms are responsible for any of the sudden acceleration problems reported in so many Toyota cars and trucks.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota adds more vehicles to sudden acceleration recall

The 4.3 million vehicles expected to be included in both the American and European recalls amount to 55 percent of the 7.81 million vehicles that Toyota sold in 2009, the Wall Street Journal says.

The number does not include the 4.2 million vehicles that Toyota announced in September in a separate safety recall of cars and trucks with the potential to accelerate suddenly and unexpectedly.

The unintended acceleration recall is the largest recall in automotive history.

Once Toyota has developed a solution to the sticking accelerator problem, the repair must be approved by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Toyota will then notify owners of the affected vehicles by mail with instructions on arranging for the free repairs.

The additional recall comes at a time when Toyota is working to recover the trust it lost with many American consumers after admittedly mishandling reports of unintended acceleration. Toyota first denied the existence of an unintended acceleration problem and acted only when a particularly gruesome and highly publicized car accident in San Diego last summer claimed the lives of California Highway Patrol officer Mark Saylor and three of his family members.

The faulty accelerator pedal components at the center of the sticking accelerator recall were supplied by a Canadian facility of CTS Automotive and used in a currently undetermined number of General Motors’ 2009 and 2010 Pontiac Vibes, which were modeled after the Toyota Prius and produced by Toyota in California. GM is expected to announce a recall of the affected Vibes soon.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota will expand latest recall to include European vehicles

Toyota

The new braking system (sometimes called a “smart pedal” or “smart throttle”) will be commanded by software that shifts the engine to idle when it detects the driver is attempting to brake while the vehicle is accelerating. The brake override will work when the vehicle is traveling at a moderate or high speed and the driver applies the brake and accelerator pedals simultaneously. The software then gives precedence to the brakes over the accelerator pedal.

Toyota is already implementing the new system in its Camry and Lexus ES 350 models. The new technology will be phased in for other models throughout the year.

Few automakers outside of Germany include a brake override system in their vehicles. Toyota’s decision to make the technology standard in all of its vehicles may help polish the company’s image and reputation, which have been tarnished by sudden acceleration reports and the company’s sluggish acknowledgment of the defect.

Mounting reports of sudden, unintended acceleration and the tragic accidents that the defect sometimes caused prompted Toyota and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to announce a recall last September of nearly 4 million Toyota cars and trucks. The recall is the second largest consumer product recall ever to occur in the U.S.

According to Toyota, the company will install brake override systems in its higher-end model recalls: the Camry, Avalon, and ES 350. Other models covered by the recall will just have the accelerator pedal shortened to ensure it can’t be jammed in full open position. No plans to install the brake override system in the other recalled models currently exist.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota will make brake override system standard in all US vehicles

Last September, Toyota and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission issued a recall of millions of Lexus and Toyota vehicles that have the potential to accelerate suddenly and unintentionally. After nearly two years of denying reports of unintended acceleration problems, Toyota finally issued a recall when California Highway Patrol Officer Mark Saylor and his family died in a crash while driving a Lexus ES 350. As tragic as that accident was, it helped bring Toyota’s unintended acceleration problem to light and prompted the company to serious and definitive action.

Inaba, who serves as the chairman of Toyota Motor Sales USA and president of Toyota Motor North America, said that his company is now working to restore quality and safety in its vehicles.

“During 2009, our commitment to quality and safety — the two most important attributes of Toyota — were severely questioned, and we learned some lessons the hard way,” Inaba said.

“These issues generated plenty of debate and unfortunately, some miscommunication,” he said. “That was our own fault.”

Inaba’s words had the same apologetic ring to them as those spoken by Akio Toyoda, Toyota’s President and grandson of the company’s founder, when he spoke at a press conference in Tokyo just after the Saylor crash last August.

“Four precious lives have been lost. I offer my deepest condolences,” Mr. Toyoda said. “Customers bought our cars because they thought they were the safest. But now we have given them cause for grave concern. I can’t begin to express my remorse.”

“Toyota has become too big and distant from its customers,” he added.

Weeks after the big apology, Inada said that Toyota learned from its mistakes and is confident that it is now “doing the right thing for our customers.”

Toyota’s desire to recover its reputation for quality and safety led to its decision to install a brake override system in all Toyota and Lexus vehicles by 2011. This system, which likely could have prevented the fatal acceleration incidents, is standard in most German vehicles and in Chryslers. Toyota is already installing the new brake override system in Toyota Camry and Lexus ES 350 models.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota says it mishandled unintended acceleration problem

Toyota’s latest recall in China comes just months after it announced its largest ever recall in that country. On August 24, 2009, Toyota recalled some 688,000 vehicles for faulty electric window systems. Less than one month later, Toyota announced its plans to recall 3.8 million vehicles in the United States because of their potential to accelerate unintentionally and speed out of control. The recall was later expanded to encompass 4.3 million vehicles, which is one of the largest safety recalls of all time, anywhere.

The recalls have landed Toyota in a public relations crisis at a time when the company is already financially distressed. Years of denying the unintended acceleration problem culminated when California Highway Patrol officer Mark Saylor and his family were killed when their rented ES 350 sped out of control on a San Diego highway. That incident, which claimed the lives of four people, prompted Toyota’s president Akio Toyoda to issue a dramatic public apology.

Just three months after assuming office as the company’s leader last summer, Toyoda said the company, which his grandfather founded in 1937, had betrayed the tradition of quality that helped it become the world’s largest automaker.

Now, Toyoda said, his company is barely able to navigate the worst economic downturn since its founding – a shameful state of affairs that put Toyota a step away from “capitulation to irrelevance or death” and left it, in his dramatic words, “grasping for salvation.”

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota announces another vehicle recall in China

According to a report by the Detroit Free Press, auto manufacturers recalled 15.2 million vehicles in 2009, a 56 percent leap over the 8.6 million of cars recalled in 2008.

Toyota vehicles represent more than 31 percent of all the vehicles recalled in 2009. About 88 percent of all recalled Toyota vehicles were recalled because of their potential to accelerate unintentionally. Eight other Toyota recalls involved a range of defects from missing safety labels to corrosion problems on the Tundra pickup frame.

Toyota spokesman Celeste Migliore called Toyota’s ranking “unfortunate” and “one Toyota doesn’t wish to have.”

“The safety of our owners and the public remain our utmost concern, and Toyota has and will take appropriate measures to correct any defect it identifies,” Migloiore told the Free Press.

Tailing Toyota on the list is Ford, which recalled more than 4.5 million cars and trucks over faulty cruise control switches that are prone to catch fire. Ford announced 8 recalls in 2009.

Third on the list is General Motors, which recalled 2.3 million vehicles and had the widest range of defects. GM announced 17 recalls in 2009.

“We are catching most problems before they affect large numbers of customers,” GM spokesman Alan Adler told the Free Press. “The important thing is to eliminate these issues and improve reliability in the view of the people who purchase our vehicles.”

Kudos to GM for acknowledging and addressing vehicle problems early. Ignoring consumer complaints or blaming the problem on something else, an approach Toyota seems to have taken for years in handling its sudden acceleration reports, ends up costing people their lives.

According to the Free Press, the U.S. had 117 auto recalls in 2009. Of those, “21 were spurred by government regulators reviewing the same data that automakers receive.”

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota recalls the most vehicles for first time ever

Since the recall was first announced, Toyota has focused on floor mats as the likely culprit. In my Tacoma, the floor mat is secured in the back by two pivoting hooks. You turn the hooks to align with the holes in the mat  and then place the mat over the hooks, adjusting it as necessary. I only remove the floor mat when I clean the vehicle thoroughly, about every other month. I remember I forgot to secure the floor mat once, but I didn’t have any problems with it sliding forward and interfering with the gas and brake pedals.

Curious about my truck’s potential to accelerate unexpectedly, I unfastened the driver’s side mat while the truck was parked and slid it forward to see how it could interfere with the accelerator pedal. I couldn’t visualize this problem occurring in my particular vehicle. I don’t see how the standard floor mat in my truck could jam the gas pedal in an open position, either by catching a part of it or coming to rest on top of it. It’s easier to imagine the problem with a heavier mat, like an optional all-weather floor mat or some rubber that wasn’t designed for the Tacoma specifically.

Still, though, it’s hard to picture the floor mat being responsible for causing some vehicles to speed and crash so violently. I know times are tough for Toyota, but let’s hope the company is 100% certain that floor mats caused all of the unintended acceleration incidents and that fixing the floor mats will prevent sudden acceleration accidents from happening again.

Some Toyota drivers, after all, have reported unintended acceleration events in cars without driver’s side floor mats, and others question why the problem ceases after turning the engine off without repositioning the mat. Whatever the problem, the consequences have been tragic when drivers weren’t able to regain control of the vehicle.

Smart pedal technology seems like it would be a panacea for whatever is causing the unintended acceleration problem, be it floor mats in one model or software problems in another. A smart pedal would disengage the accelerator if it were pressed concurrently with the brakes.

It’s also standard technology in most German vehicles and Chryslers. But the thought of retrofitting 3.8 million vehicles with it could have Toyota scrambling for a less expensive fix.

In the recall announcement, Toyota says that it is “currently developing a campaign remedy and will notify you when it is ready.”

Read the Toyota recall letter.

Other sources: Consumer Affairs

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota mails recall announcements, but no fix yet

Toyota and Lexus owners have lodged more than 2,000 complaints of sudden and unintended acceleration against Toyota, according to the lawsuit. Toyota’s unintended acceleration problem has caused numerous accidents, resulting in 16 deaths and 243 injuries, the suit alleges.

The plaintiffs, Seong Bae Choi and Chris Chan Park of Los Angeles, filed their lawsuit as a class action, seeking to represent the owners of all Toyota and Lexus models affected by the unintended acceleration problem and included in Toyota’s latest recall.

According to the lawsuit, Toyota “failed to incorporate failsafe measures” that allow drivers to maintain control of the vehicles in an unintended acceleration situation. The plaintiffs allege that the acceleration problem is the result of faulty electronics.

In the affected cars, acceleration is regulated by an electronic throttle control system called the ETCS-i.

The plaintiffs also claim that Toyota could have implemented smart pedal technology that would “automatically reduce the engine to idle when the brakes are being applied while the throttle is an open position.” Such technology is standard in almost all German-made cars and Chryslers.

The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration hasn’t adopted a very clear stance on the issue. The agency says that it hasn’t found sufficient evidence of electronic defects in the cars it has analyzed, but that it has found evidence that floor mats could jam the accelerator pedals. Yet when it denied a request to further investigate Lexus ES models, the agency said that doing so did not “constitute a finding by the NHTSA that a safety-related defect does not exist.”

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › California men file sudden acceleration lawsuit against Toyota

Since the NHTSA first announced the recall on September 29, there has been a lot of conflicting information and confusion about the cause and solution of unintended acceleration in the recalled vehicles.

Early media reports claimed that floor mats caused the problem because they could slide forward and jam the accelerator pedal. Later reports suggested that Toyota would not issue a floor mat recall but instead would implement a “smart pedal” solution that would allow the brakes to disengage the accelerator when both pedals were simultaneously used. Subsequent reports indicated that the massive recall – the largest ever for Toyota – would indeed focus on the floor mat design only.

According to the NHTSA, in a press release published earlier this week, Toyota “inaccurately stated NHTSA had reached a conclusion ‘that no defect exists in vehicles in which the driver’s floor mat is compatible with the vehicle and properly secured.’”

The NHTSA said that it simply told consumers to remove the driver’s side floor mats in all affected vehicles as an “interim measure” to help prevent unintended acceleration from occurring.

“This remedy does not correct the underlying defect in the vehicles involving the potential for entrapment of the accelerator by floor mats, which is related to accelerator and floor pan design,” the NHTSA said, adding that it continues to work with Toyota to “fix this very dangerous problem.”

“This matter is not closed until Toyota has effectively addressed the defect by providing a suitable vehicle based solution,” the NHTSA warned.

Owners of the recalled Toyota and Lexus models are being notified of the recall by first-class mail. Once a solution is developed, consumers will be told in a second mailing the procedure for getting their vehicles fixed.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota issued misleading and inaccurate recall info, NHTSA says

Toyota, however, is reportedly considering implementing this technology as a solution to the acceleration problems in up to 3.8 million Toyota and Lexus vehicles. Toyota announced last month that it would soon issue a vehicle recall over concerns that the driver’s side floor mats can slide forward and jam the accelerator pedal in full open position.

Toyota’s recall announcement followed the highly publicized deaths of Mark Saylor and his family members, who were riding in a Lexus ES 350 that sped out of control last August. The incident ended in a fiery crash, claiming the lives of everyone onboard and prompting a dramatic public apology from Toyota Motor Corp.’s president Akio Toyoda, who said his company was “grasping for salvation.”

In a New York Times report, BMW spokesman Thomas Plucinsky said that the brake pedal has taken precedence over the gas pedal in all of its cars beginning with the 2005 models. Unintended acceleration shepherded the design of BMW’s smart pedal, which tells the car’s electronic circuitry to ignore the gas pedal when the brake pedal is pressed simultaneously.

Brian Lyons, a spokesman for Toyota, told the New York Times that the company was considering the implementation of smart pedals rather than a redesign of the floor mats as a solution to the unintended acceleration problem.

Audi, Volkswagen, and Chrysler are other car manufacturers that have standardized a similar safety feature in all vehicles.

A Honda spokesman told the New York Times that his company continues to “accept application of the accelerator and brake pedals as representing the driver’s intention.” It’s a position still held by General Motors, Ford, Acura, Nissan and Hyundai.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota may use “smart pedal” to fix unintended accleration problem

Toyota

Previously we have reported on this web site that some of the drivers who became caught in a runaway car were unable to remedy the situation. There’s the story of Bulent and Anne Ezal, whose 2005 Camry accelerated unintentionally in the parking lot of a Pismo Beach, California, restaurant, causing the vehicle to plunge off a cliff and killing Anne. Shortly after that February 2007 accident in Pismo Beach, Jean Bookout lost control of her 2005 Camry as it sped off an Oklahoma interstate. Attempts to stop the vehicle were unsuccessful. Jean’s friend Barbara Schwarz was killed when the car hit an embankment, and Barbara spent months in the hospital with serious head and back injuries.

Another unintended acceleration incident, which happened just this past August, found off-duty California Highway Patrol officer Mark Saylor careening down a San Diego County highway at speeds topping 120 mph, according to witnesses. Saylor never could gain control of the Lexus ES 350. The car crashed, killing Saylor and his wife, daughter, and brother-in-law.

Likewise, Guadalupe Gomez couldn’t regain control of his 2007 Camry as it raced uncontrollably down a busy San Jose freeway at speeds of more than 100 mph. Gomez tried everything he could think of to stop the vehicle, but nothing worked. Gomez’s Camry struck a Honda Accord, killing a California father of 5 – an accident for which Gomez was arrested and sued.

Of course, it’s difficult to tell for certain whether the floor mats were solely to blame for these accidents. There are other reports of unintended acceleration in Toyota vehicles that are not easily pinned on a floor mat problem. While Toyota investigates the problem, it urges drivers of the affected Toyota vehicles to drive without floor mats.

However, Toyota realizes that not all consumers will choose to drive without the mats. In its announcement, Toyota gives instructions on what to do if a driver is caught in an unintended acceleration situation:

• First, if it is possible and safe to do so, pull back the floor mat and dislodge it from the accelerator pedal; then pull over and stop the vehicle.
• If the floor mat cannot be dislodged, then firmly and steadily step on the brake pedal with both feet. Do NOT pump the brake pedal repeatedly as this will increase the effort required to slow the vehicle.
• Shift the transmission gear selector to the Neutral (N) position and use the brakes to make a controlled stop at the side of the road and turn off the engine.
• If unable to put the vehicle in Neutral, turn the engine OFF, or to ACC. This will not cause loss of steering or braking control, but the power assist to these systems will be lost.
• If the vehicle is equipped with an Engine Start/Stop button, firmly and steadily push the button for at least three seconds to turn off the engine. Do NOT tap the Engine Start/Stop button.
• If the vehicle is equipped with a conventional key-ignition, turn the ignition key to the ACC position to turn off the engine. Do NOT remove the key from the ignition as this will lock the steering wheel.

More information about the recall and floor mat installation can be found on http://www.toyota.com.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › What should you do in a car that speeds out of control?

The accident was so violent and so outwardly reckless that authorities in turn chased after Gomez with accusations of vehicular manslaughter and gross negligence. Prosecutors ultimately believed they couldn’t persuade a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that Gomez was responsible for the accident and dropped the charges. But Gomez couldn’t escape a lawsuit naming him and Toyota as defendants filed by Johnson’s family. The case was settled earlier this year for an undisclosed amount of damages.

For over 2 years, Gomez has had to live with the trauma of the crash and the stigma of causing it. Then, on September 29, Toyota issued a safety advisory and recall notice, warning owners of several models of Toyota and Lexus cars that a floor mat defect could interfere with the acceleration pedal and cause the cars to speed uncontrollably.

Investigators found evidence that the floor mat in Gomez’s Camry could have interfered with the accelerator, but in 2007 the unintended acceleration problem was a relatively obscure one to everyone but Toyota.

Now the recall has cast a completely different light on the 2007 incident, and even the attorneys who represented Johnson’s family in court have expressed their sympathy for Gomez.

“This poor man (Gomez) was just driving his car and this happened,” Mohinder Mann, the attorney representing Johnson’s family, told the Mercury News. “He was very honest, he told everybody what happened, but (California Highway Patrol) wanted to blame him.”

Gary Mann, another attorney who represented the Johnson family, said that Gomez was “very remorseful” about the accident. “Toyota was attempting to put some blame on him, but he did everything he could to stop the car and prevent it from crashing,” Mann told the Mercury News.

Gomez, now 70, told the Mercury News that he wanted to keep the incident in the past. “It’s a closed chapter in my life and I would prefer not to go into it,” he told the Mercury News.

Sources: Silicon Valley Mercury News; CBS 5 San Francisco

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Latest Toyota recall vindicates CA man accused of causing fatal crash

While a defective floor mat advisory may sound relatively harmless, the problem can turn into a deadly one for some drivers. Yesterday, we wrote about the death of four family members near San Diego, California on August 28. The family was driving a Lexus ES 350, a loaner car from their dealership, when the driver, Mark Saylor, called 911 to report that the vehicle was violently accelerating and he had no ability to brake. The runaway car launched off an embankment, rolled several times, and burst into flames, killing everyone inside. Witnesses said that the Lexus was weaving on the road and traveling over 120 mph when it left the road.

The complaints that prompted Toyota’s 2007 investigation of the floor mats and unintended acceleration problem came from the drivers of five Lexus ES 350s, the same model that Saylor was driving. After ruling out electronics as a cause of sudden acceleration, investigators analyzed the floor mat and accelerator pedal designs. They found that the gas pedal’s design allowed it to become jammed in the groove of the heavy all-weather floor mat if the mat wasn’t properly secured by its retaining hooks. If drivers placed the all-weather mats, which are optional accessories in many Lexus models, on top of the standard mats, the retaining hooks can’t be used. Toyota printed a written warnings on the rubber all-weather mats but they were small and easy to overlook.

The same safety report also determined that “With the engine throttle plate open, the vacuum power assist of the braking system cannot be replenished and the effectiveness of the brakes is reduced significantly.” The distance required to stop the vehicle went 200 feet to 1,000 feet. Instead of 30 pounds of pressure on the brake pedal, the driver had to use 150 pounds of force.

The ignition button also contributes to the dilemma of a runaway vehicle like the one Mark Saylor and his family experienced. Instead of a key ignition, Lexus cars use a start button. To turn off the engine of a Lexus during an emergency, the button must be pressed and held for 3 seconds – a safety feature that was not mentioned in the car manual before 2009 and a procedure that few Lexus owners know about.

Whatever defect caused Saylor to lose control of the Lexus that day, it seems likely he would have tried to stop the engine. Tragically, it seems equally likely that he had no idea how to do that.

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Unintentional acceleration problem is an old one for Toyota

Toyota Motor Corp

The recall was prompted by the tragic death of four family members in San Diego County, California late last month. Mark Saylor, a 45-year-old California Highway Patrol officer was driving along state route 125 in the town of Santee with his wife Cleofe, 45, their daughter Mahala, 13, and Saylor’s brother-in-law Chris Lastrella, 38 when the vehicle, a 2009 Lexus ES 350, accelerated to over 120 mph. Saylor managed to call 911 about a minute before the vehicle crashed to report that the vehicle was accelerating uncontrollably and the brakes weren’t working.

According to a report in the Miami Herald, the 911 call picked up the voice of one of the passengers telling the others to hold on and pray, followed by a woman’s scream. The call then ended.

The vehicle sailed off an embankment and rolled over several times before bursting into flames. Investigators discovered that the floor mat in the Lexus, which was loaned to Saylor by a dealership while his car was being serviced, didn’t belong to that model Lexus. They theorize that the mat, which was two inches longer than the proper mat, could have interfered with the accelerator.

Many Toyota Prius drivers are skeptical that floor mats cause the sudden acceleration, at least in their vehicles.

A California woman identified as Karen told ConsumerAffairs.com that she experienced sudden acceleration in her 2007 Prius twice. When she reported the problem to her dealer, she “listened as the service manager blamed everything that occurred on nothing more than a carpet jamming the accelerator pedal,” according to a report on the ConsumerAffairs website. However, Karen’s Prius didn’t have floor mats when the incident first happened.

In 2007, Toyota recalled its Camry and Lexus ES 350 models after receiving reports that the heavy floor mats became jammed under the accelerator pedal, causing the vehicle to accelerate suddenly. The NHTSA, however, said that the recall failed to fix the problem because the agency continued to receive reports of unexpected acceleration after the recall.

Whatever the cause, the NHTSA warned drivers of all affected models to remove the floor mats immediately and drive without them until that can be replaced. The recall covers the following Toyotas:

• 2007-2010 Camry
• 2005-2010 Avalon
• 2004-2009 Prius
• 2005-2010 Tacoma
• 2007-2010 Tundra
• 2007-2010 Lexus ES 350
• 2006-2010 Lexus IS 250 and IS350

SOURCE: Personal Injury Attorneys › Toyota Motor Corp. announces massive recall