Crashworthiness Cases
Is It More than Just an Automobile Accident?
William A. Atlee, Jr., Esquire
Jaime D. Jackson, Esquire

Crashworthiness cases involve the allegation that a defendant manufacturer failed to take precautions to reduce the likelihood of injuries resulting from a foreseeable collision. This type of liability has been variously referred to as “crashworthiness,” “enhanced injury,” and “second impact or collision.” The vehicle is defective if it is designed or manufactured in such a way that the injuries the occupant sustained in a collision are greater than injuries one would normally expect in that type of collision.

Legally, crashworthiness was first recognized in Pennsylvania in Kupetz v. Deere & Co., Inc., 644 A.2d 1213 (Pa. Super. 1994.) The court recognized that recovery is allowed against the manufacturer for any injuries attributable to a product defect over and above those injuries caused by the initial or first collision. This is true even though the injury causing defect was not the cause of the initial collision or accident.

The vehicle is the most important piece of evidence in this type of case. The vehicle must be located and secured. In addition, it is critically important to have the scene examined and preserve any evidence from the scene, like tire marks, gouge marks, or component parts. There are a number of things to look at in evaluating a potential crashworthiness case. The following is a brief synopsis of different types of frequent crashworthiness cases:

Post-Collision, Fuel-Fed Fires. Vehicle manufacturers have a duty to the public to design vehicles that will not create a fire hazard in survivable collisions. In the early 1970’s, a General Motors engineer indicated that GM should be designing their vehicles so that if the occupants survive the collision, they should not be burned in a post-collision, fuel-fed fire. There are several common fuel system defects that can cause fuel leaks which result in post-collision fires:

• Fuel tanks may be punctured and leak in an accident;
• Fuel lines may be compromised – the location and composition of the fuel lines is critical to the overall fuel system integrity of a vehicle;
• Most fuel-injected engines have electric fuel pumps. It is critical that these pumps shut off in the event of a collision; and
• It is possible for fuel to siphon from a fuel tank after a collision, providing a continuing source of fuel for a vehicle fire. This potential hazard can be eliminated with check valves or anti-siphoning devices.

Air Bags. Air bags are supposed to be fully inflated before the passenger falls into it during a crash. Serious injuries occur when air bags, which can travel at speeds up to 200 mph, hit occupants prior to full inflation. There are numerous low-speed impacts where an air bag may deploy when it is unnecessary. Safer air bags include air bags with higher deployment thresholds, less aggressive air bags, tethers, better sensors, and adjustable or dual-stage inflators.

Rollover. Recent Government surveys indicate that pick-ups and sport utility vehicles (SUVs) have a rollover rate that is 2 to 3 times higher than the average passenger car. 80% of all deaths in single vehicle crashes of SUVs involve rollovers.

Roof Crush. As part of a vehicle's structural support system, a roof creates a “non-encroachment zone” or “survival space” that should protect occupants in a crash. If a roof crushes substantially in an accident, the occupants may suffer disabling head or neck injuries.

Seat Belts. When a seat belt works properly, it is undisputably the most important safety device in an automobile. When it works poorly or completely fails to work, the seat belt can cause serious injury and even death. When an occupant is killed or seriously injured in a car accident, despite wearing his/her seat belt, it is reasonable to ask “why.”

Unfortunately, millions of vehicles on the road have defective seat belt systems that are incapable of providing reasonable protection in otherwise survivable accidents. Many of these defects have been known to the auto industry for many years, including inertial unlatching and false latching, torn or ripped webbing, retractor failure, window shade devices and poor seat belt geometry. Two of the more notorious defects are the lap-only belt designs and door-mounted and other automatic belt systems. Although the benefits of utilizing a lap and shoulder belt have been known for decades, shoulder belts were not included in the rear seats of most U.S. cars until the late 1980’s. Lap-only belts can lead to fatal or catastrophic injuries, including head and spinal cord and other internal injuries.

Door-mounted and other automatic belt systems pose a slew of safety risks, including occupant ejection when the door opens during a crash, and severe spinal cord injuries when an occupant with an automatic shoulder belt forgets to put the manual lap belt on.

Tire Failure. This has been a problem for years, but has come under increased scrutiny recently due to the Firestone debacle. Tire failures, separations and blow-outs are foreseeable events that occur on a daily basis. However, a tire will often fail to do its job due to a manufacturing or design defect long before the tread on the tire has worn out. The most common form of failure is tread separation, predominately found on steel-belted radials; the most common type of tire today. Some tire designs are more prone to tread separation than others.

Seats/Seat Backs. As a direct result of weak and defective designs of automobile seats and their components, such as seat backs, recliner mechanisms, and seat tracts, thousands of otherwise preventable injuries occur each year in rear-impact collisions. The seat is essentially an occupant restraint. Much like the seatbelt system prevents an occupant from moving forward in a frontal collision, the seat should perform the same function in a rear impact collision, and prevent the occupant from striking the interior of the vehicle or being ejected. Seats and their components suffer a variety of failure modes in rear-impact collisions including breakage of seat adjustors, breakage of folding seatback locks and supports, or separation of the anchorage from the vehicle.

Child Safety Seats and Booster Seats. Many of the devices sold in toy stores and baby shops are not up to the task of protecting children in crashes. Every year, hundreds of children suffer serious and often fatal injuries in automobile accidents, even though they were restrained in child safety seats or booster seats. Many of these injuries and deaths could have been prevented. Most of these children could have survived the accidents without any serious injuries if they had been properly restrained in well designed, well built, and properly installed child safety seats or booster seats. Some common problems with child safety seats relate to manufacturing defects, including defectively manufactured plastic shelves, harnesses and accessories. Common design defects in child seats generally relate to shell design and buckle and latch design, inadequate padding and harness design, just to name a few.

“Black Box” Technology. Almost all late-model vehicles are equipped with a type of crash data recorder. They have become sometimes known as “black boxes” because of the well-known devices on-board airplanes. Basically, the module or sensor system is tied into the airbag module and monitors the status of the vehicle just before and during a crash. The device can record such helpful information as whether the occupant was belted, timing of airbag deployment, delta V (change in velocity) braking, and even engine RPMs. It is important to note that each vehicle involved in the accident may have such a device and record useful information in a crash.

Many manufacturers have ignored vehicle crashworthiness, relying on inadequate government standards. When there is a motor vehicle accident and the resultant injuries are more severe than one would expect, given the facts of the accident, then the possibility of crashworthiness does exist. If the injuries are significant, it is important to do a thorough investigation to determine whether or not those injuries were the result of a defect in the design or manufacture of the vehicle, as opposed to the natural consequences of the accident or collision.
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