Texas jury awards $242 million damages in Lexus crash

[Thackeray]

I haven't seen this story reported in the UK:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-jury-finds-evidence-of-gross-negligence-by-toyota-seatback-collision/

 

Edit: I found that the video didn't play from that link but I think it's the ad blocker on my browser that was blocking the video. When I turn off the ad blocker the video plays correctly.

[gdh300]

Wow, potential can of worms opened there. Devastating for the family clearly, I wonder how many more are affected by a type of accident? Most car design concentrates on frontal impacts, and more recently side impacts, I don't recall any NCAP, etc. test specifically evaluating rear impacts.

Interesting it concerns a 2002 Lexus involved in an accident in 2016, seemingly no statute of limitation here as far as the NHTSA are concerned.

[colin79666]

Awful, especially as it would appear from the reports that various manufacturers have known about it for years and could fairly easily and cheaply fixed it. I'd be interested to know if those in the front seat had belts on. The snippet of crash test video in this report shows the dummy flying into the backseat but they aren't belted in: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbs-news-investigation-of-seat-back-failures-sparks-action-by-congress/

Euro NCAP have been doing whiplash tests for years but only at slow speeds so the seat isn't under such stress.

[reeac]

Given that the seats reportedly met or exceeded Federal requirements I'm surprised at the verdict. What, then, is the point of having these design/performance requirements?