Burned tot’s parents file lawsuit over toy tractor

An Athens County couple has sued the manufacturer of a battery-operated toy riding tractor that they say burst into flames, severely injuring their toddler son.

Wyatt Buckley, now 3, who lives outside Albany, was burned over more than 50 percent of his body when the toy tractor he was riding in his yard ignited on June 3, according to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Columbus.

The lawsuit against the toy’s manufacturer, Peg Perego USA Inc. — an Italian company with U.S. offices in Fort Wayne, Ind. — seeks unspecified damages for his parents, Marlon and Heather Buckley.

It says the fire was caused either by a defective product or a defective manufacturing process. The tractor was powered by a 12-volt battery.

“A toy given to a 2-year-old just can’t catch on fire; and if it does catch on fire, it should be designed and manufactured so it wouldn’t continue to burn so it would not cause catastrophic harm to the child,” said Andrew List, the attorney for the Buckley family.

Wyatt potentially faces a lifetime of surgeries and medical treatment, List said.

Mrs. Buckley said her son is improving every day, “but he still has a long way to go.”

Peg Perego could not be reached for comment. However, the company said in a statement at the time of the incident that “the materials of our toys cannot suddenly burst into flames. We are confident that other extraordinary external factors were involved to cause such a sudden fire.”

_______________________________
Source: The Columbus Dispatch (Woods, 1/25)

Report ranks Texas among the worst for passing highway safety laws

Texas ranks among the worst states for passing highway safety laws, according to an annual report released this week.

Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety released the “Roadmap of State Highway Safety Laws” grading all 50 states and the District of Columbia on their performance based on 15 basic traffic safety laws.

Texas — which last year became the first state to pass an 85-mph speed limit — joined about a dozen states in the bottom tier.

Texas has 80,000 miles of state-run roads, and the last day there wasn't a fatality on Texas highways was Nov. 7, 2000, according to the Texas Department of Transportation. State lawmakers, however, have been slow to adopt some of the measures the national safety group sees as steps to improve road safety and reduce deaths.

“We know what works to reduce and eventually eliminate drunk driving from our roads,” said Jan Withers, president of the national Mothers Against Drunk Driving. “We now call on state legislatures across the country to do their part.”

The U.S. recently has seen the largest jump in traffic fatalities since 1975, a 7 percent increase in crash deaths during the first nine months of 2012 compared with the same period in 2011, according to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration data. The report focuses on a new federal incentive grant program that encourages states to enact teen driver licensing laws, ignition interlock laws, distracted driving laws and occupant protection laws.

Among the 15 highway safety laws evaluated by the group are seat belt, booster seat and motorcycle helmet measures, in addition to restrictions and requirements for teen drivers, texting bans and tougher impaired driving laws.

Texas did not have eight of the 15 recommended laws.

The report found an additional 316 new laws need to be adopted in all states to meet the recommendations, including 15 states still needing a law banning all drivers from texting.

Last year, Alabama, Idaho and West Virginia passed all-driver texting bans, joining the majority of states that have passed such laws. (Some states have laws prohibiting drivers from using cellphones in certain areas such as school zones.)

State Rep. Tom Craddick, R-Midland, refiled a texting-ban bill for the 2013 legislative session. In 2011, Gov. Rick Perry made an unprecedented move of vetoing a texting ban passed by the Legislature, drawing criticism from national highway safety groups. Bob Kaufman, a Texas Department of Transportation spokesman, said the agency uses awareness campaigns to prioritize safety, such as the “Click It or Ticket” campaign, which he said has led to seat belt use increasing from 75 percent to 94 percent in the past 11 years.

He also said awareness campaigns have improved behavior in the areas of drunken driving, motorcycle safety and proper child passenger restraint. “Important to remember, drivers hold the key to driving safely,” Kaufman said. “We encourage drivers to adhere to some basic safe driving tips: Pay attention, buckle seat belts, put the phone away, never drink and drive, obey all traffic laws and drive to conditions.”

__________________________________
Source: MySanAntonio (Mulvaney, 1/17)

Road accidents rise as rainfall sets records

In one of at least two weather-related crashes in the area, a Midland man was transported to Midland Memorial Hospital with minor injuries after a wreck on State Highway 349.

Martin County DPS responded to the accident at about 11:40 a.m. on State Highway 349.

Midlander Michael Wade was driving a white pickup pulling a trailer with a backhoe south on Highway 349. A dump truck, also pulling a backhoe, was traveling south behind an SUV that was following the pickup, said Sean Baxter, DPS public information officer.

The pickup hydroplaned and veered right off the highway and then back onto the road. When the pickup came back across the highway, the dump truck hit the pickup’s trailer, he said.

Pickup passenger Mitchell Dinsmorre, of Midland, was transported to MMH with minor injuries. He was treated and released, Baxter said.

The SUV was not involved in the crash.

Citations were not issued because of the weather conditions that contributed to the crash, but DPS is continuing to investigate, he said.

Meanwhile, no one was reported injured Wednesday afternoon after an 18-wheeler hydroplaned into a light pole on Loop 250.

Midland police responded to the crash at about 1:34 p.m. at the 1000 block of West Loop 250 North near the “A” Street overpass.

The 18-wheeler was eastbound on the loop when the vehicle began drifting and jackknifed into a light pole in the median, said an officer at the scene.

The wreck caused significant traffic delays for at least two hours. Again, citations were not issued because of the weather conditions.

Later that afternoon, a two-vehicle crash occurred near the intersection of West Scharbauer Drive and North I Street.

Midland police who responded to the crash at about 3:51 p.m. found an SUV had flipped over. Officers determined that a car traveling northbound on I Street collided with the SUV that was westbound on Scharbauer Drive.

No one was injured, said an officer at the scene. The driver of the Lexus was cited for failure to yield right of way.

____________________________
Source: MyWestTexas (White, 1/9)

Consumers warned to check Fisher-Price infant sleepers after mold reported, 16 infants treated

WASHINGTON — The government is warning consumers to inspect Fisher-Price Newborn Rock ‘N Play Sleepers due to risk of exposure to mold for infants who use them.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission said Tuesday that its warning applies to 800,000 infant recliner seats, called sleepers, that were sold at stores nationwide and online since September 2009, with prices ranging between $50 and $85. The seats, designed for babies up to 25 pounds, feature a soft plastic seat held in a tubular metal rocking frame. The product has a removable fabric cover.

Mold can develop between the removable seat cushion and the hard plastic frame if the sleeper remains wet or is infrequently cleaned, the agency said. Mold is associated with respiratory illnesses and other infections, the warning said. Fisher-Price has received 600 reports of mold and 16 infants have been treated for respiratory issues, coughs and hives after they were in the Fisher-Price sleepers.

The agency said consumers should check for dark brown, gray or black spots that can indicate the presence of mold under the removable seat cushion. If mold is found, they are advised to immediately stop using the product and to contact Fisher-Price for cleaning instructions or further assistance.

Units currently in retail stores are not affected by the warning, but mold growth can occur after use of the infant sleepers.

__________________________
Source: Washington Post (AP, 1/8)

Toyota to pay $1.1B in 'unintended acceleration' cases

LOS ANGELES — After years of litigation and probes, Toyota announced a $1.1 billion settlement Wednesday to resolve lawsuits alleging "unintended acceleration" in some Toyota and Lexus models.

Toyota recalled millions of vehicles in 2009 and 2010 related to charges that throttles could jam in the open position.

Toyota will create a fund for retrofitting 3.2 million Toyota and Lexus cars with technology that makes them easier to stop in a panic situation, as part of the settlement in a U.S. District Court case that sought class-action status. Owners of models that can't be retrofitted will receive cash payouts. And those who sold their vehicles in late 2009 and all of 2010 will be eligible for compensation due to lowered resale value due to the issue.

In all, the company says the agreement affects 16 million owners of vehicles with electronic throttle controls, whether or not they were part of the recalls.

Toyota maintains that the bulk of unintended acceleration cases were due to floor mats that slid underneath accelerators and became trapped — and not the result of electronic defects in the cars' engine computers.

"We felt we achieved our objective, to defend the safety of the product," says spokesman Mike Michels. That having been done, the settlement is "a business decision and we turn the page on a lot of this."

The settlement is expected to be approved Friday by U.S. District Court Judge James Selna.

"After two years of intense work, including deposing hundreds of engineers, poring over thousands of documents and examining millions of lines of software code, we are pleased that Toyota has agreed to a settlement that was both extraordinarily hard fought and is exceptionally far-reaching," says Steve Berman, co-lead counsel for plaintiffs in the cases.

At least one industry analyst says the settlement is proof that Toyota was culpable. "Automakers don't pay billions of dollars to get rid of litigation involving driver error," says Sean Kane of Safety Research & Strategies.

The settlement comes more than three years after the fatal crash of a Lexus that killed an off-duty California Highway Patrol officer and his family near San Diego erupted into a full-blown scandal for the automaker.

At first, Toyota answered the sudden acceleration charges by saying that floor mats could become trapped under acceleration pedals. Then later, Toyota announced a series of worldwide recalls involving millions of cars, including some for potentially defective accelerator assemblies.

Toyota executives appeared before congressional hearings and were questioned about the issue. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration launched an engineering investigation that was never able to show any electronic bugs were the cause of unintended acceleration. But the agency never dropped the issue.

Last week, NHTSA levied a $17.35 million fine against Toyota — the maximum currently allowed for a single violation — for waiting too long to report the issue that led to just one of the series of recalls, involving the 2010 Lexus RX 350 and RX 450h crossover SUVs.

To settle the unintended acceleration cases, Toyota agreed to:

Install a brake-override system in non-hybrid vehicles that were subject to floor-mat entrapment recalls. The systems, which are now common in new Toyota and Lexus vehicles, cut power to the engine when they sense that the driver is trying to stop the vehicle as if in a panic, such as by repeatedly pushing the brake pedal. Toyota says its hybrids don't need the system.

Put $250 million into a fund for former owners who sold their cars between Sept. 1, 2009, and Dec. 31, 2010, or leased them during the period to compensate them for reduced value of their vehicles due to publicity around issues of Toyota's unintended acceleration. The actual amount that will go to any individual owner wasn't immediately disclosed. It may become more clear, says Berman spokesman Mark Firmani, after Friday's hearing.

Create a separate $250 million pool to compensate owners of non-hybrid cars that can't be retrofitted with the brake-override system. Toyota spokesman Michels says cars without the system are still safe because the brake-override system is "not a prevention or cure" for floor mats that can become trapped under pedals.

Establish a "customer care plan" for all 16 million affected Toyota customers to add another three to 10 years to the warranty period for parts that could be related to unintended acceleration.

Pay $30 million to issue grants for study of auto safety and enhanced driver education.

_____________________________
Source: USA Today (Woodyard, 12/26)