NASA To Help Investigate Unintended Acceleration

Gee, maybe it is rocket science.

Despite decades of experience and data indicating that the vast majority of unintended acceleration incidents fully investigated end up being cases of drivers standing on the gas instead of the brake, the Obama administration has decided to launch not one, but two investigations...one by the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) with the help of The National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA) and the other by The National Academy of Sciences...to get to the bottom of the unintended acceleration incidents that have been plaguing Toyota and other manufacturers.

How long? 15 months.

How much? $3 million.

Full story from The Detroit News.

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Toyota Death Toll: 102

The Los Angeles Times says its review of public records indicates 102 people have been killed in Toyota vehicle accidents linked to unintended acceleration.

Two things to remember when reading the piece: One, that the number of reports increases when a problem is reported and many of those reports are later found to be unrelated to the problem. And two, that in the vast majority of cases fully investigated where a cause can be found, unintended acceleration incidents end up being a case of drivers standing on the gas pedal when they believe (and have reported, if they survived) they were standing on the brake.

Full story from the Times here.

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Consumer Reports Demonstrates Stopping Distance Difference With Brake Override

Brake override cuts the gas when you apply a certain amount of pressure on the brake. There's a push to make it mandatory, thinking that it will help end cases of unintended acceleration. Never mind that most of those cases thus far have shown that the drivers weren't on the brake at all, but instead standing on the gas pedal.

Well, Consumer Reports says whether your acceleration is unintended or not, brake override cuts the stopping distance of your car...which is a good thing.

And, because they know we worry...CR also says brake override won't affect "enthusiast driving".

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Unanimous: Harrison, NY PD Agrees: Driver Error, Not Unintended Acceleration

The one on the right is the gas pedal. The one on the left is the brake pedal. The chief of the Harrison, New York Police Department says, yep...the 55 year old woman who crashed her Toyota Prius hybrid into a stone wall two weeks ago...the one he said couldn't have been driver error at the time.....was, well, driver error, the most common cause of fully investigated unintended acceleration incidents.

Captain Anthony Marracccini says his department's investigation confirms what Toyota and the NHTSA's found...that the throttle was wide-open at the time of impact...with no sign of any application of the brake.

AP story via The Detroit News here. Conversations among Prius drivers on the PriusChat forums.

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Harrison, NY Police To Announce "Runaway Prius" Findings This Afternoon

Yes, we know...in fact, we told you on Friday...the NHTSA says the 55-year old woman whose Prius crashed into a wall in the NYC suburb had her foot on the gas, not the brake.

But instead of saying..."yeah...what the feds say....", the Harrison PD plans to announce their own findings this afternoon. It should be interesting, given that the police chief started by ruling out driver error at the scene two weeks ago, then amended his position to a definite maybe last week, before the NHTSA announced the results of its investigation.

The PriusChat forums are talking about it here.

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UPDATE: NY Prius Case Human Error

NHTSA says the Toyota Prius driven into a wall by a 55 year old woman in Harrison, New York last week did not experience sudden acceleration. Investigators say their technical analysis of the vehicle show the throttle was open and no brakes were being applied.

That's what's called human error...and as we reported last week, that's the most common finding once investigators dig into allegations of unintended acceleration.

So it's two down as Toyota battles back against sensational stories of Priuses that allegedly defied driver attempts to stop.

Full story from The Detroit News here and discussion on the Prius Chat forums here.

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NY Police Chief Reverses Self; Says Driver Error "Possible" In Prius Incident

One day after the joint Toyota/federal examination of a Harrison, New York Prius alleged to have had an unintended acceleration incident, crashing into a wall, the Harrison Police Chief, who ruled out driver error last week, now says it's possible.

Full story from The New York Post, and discussion on the Prius Chat forums.

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Toyota, Feds To Investigate New York Runaway Prius Claim Today

Toyota, fresh from tests that contradict the story of a "runaway Prius" driver in San Diego County, California, is in Harrison, New York today to inspect a Prius that, according to a 56 year old woman, sped up and rammed into a stone wall.

The company and federal investigators will be going over that car using the same methods as they did in San Diego...with a critical eye on how many times the driver hit the brakes and the accelerator.

Full story from the Associated Press here.

Prius owners are talking about it on the Prius Chat forums.

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Unintended Acceleration: Does It Come From Outer Space?

The Detroit Free Press is reporting that NHTSA is looking into the possiblity that Toyota's sudden acceleration issues (assuming they have any apart from people standing on the wrong pedal) might be linked to cosmic rays.

Full article and a link to the .pdf of the anonymous tip to the Feds from "A concerned scientist" (really) here.

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NY Times Op-Ed: Unintended Acceleration Usually Foot On Wrong Pedal

Those of a certain age will remember that in the mid-1980s Audi had its own unintended acceleration problem...onto which gasoline and a whole boxful of matches was thrown by Morley Safer and the gang at CBS' 60 Minutes.

The story was that the Audi 5000 would roar off by itself, hurting and killing people.

Ultimately, it was shown that the drivers were stomping on the accelerator when they thought (or at least said) it was the brake. But Audi very nearly didn't survive the controversy.

Well, Professor Richard A. Schmidt was one of those who dug past the hype and found the truth 24 years ago...and in an op-ed piece in The New York Times on Wednesday (hat tip to The Truth About Cars for pointing it out), he says history may be repeating itself. Just substitute 2010 for 1985, Toyota for Audi, Prius for 5000.

Read it here.

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