NHTSA unable to find out what happened to the runaway 2008 Prius
By Andrew C., 30 Aug, 2010. 0 Comments
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has yet to find evidence that would either support or contradict a claim from a California motorist that his Toyota Prius sped out of control on its own.
It even mentioned the possibility that the case would never be explained. The engineers at the NHTSA tested the 2008 hybrid, attempting to recreate the unintended acceleration incident reported by owner James Sikes. NHTSA engineers drove the car on the freeway and got a copy of diagnostic readouts from the vehicle's data recorder. Continued after the jump!
In its first statement on the analysis conducted with Toyota Motor Corp., the US regulators said that they were unable to recreate the occurrence. Toyota has scheduled a press conference to address the issue.
According to Sikes’ testimony, he was driving the car on a freeway near San Diego when it unintentionally accelerated at speeds of up 90mph just as he was passing another vehicle. Fortunately, Sikes was assisted by police who helped him bring the car to a stop.
This incident, which lasted 20 minutes and covered about 30 miles, worsens the recall crisis that Toyota faces over claims of unintended acceleration.
Two NHTSA investigators worked with Toyota experts to examine Sikes' Prius. The NHTSA said that it is still examining the data from the car‚ data recorder, which supposedly contains snapshots of information about speed, braking, throttle position and other parameters.
[via autonews - sub. required]
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