Ford Pinto

IN 1971, FORD Motor Company introduced the Pinto as its entry into the subcompact market. Fighting strong competition for the lucrative smallcar market, Ford rushed the Pinto into production in much less than the usual time.

Ford engineers discovered in pre-production crash tests that rear-end collisions would rupture the Pinto's fuel system. Because assembly-line machinery was already tooled when engineers found this defect, Ford officials decided to manufacture the car anyway, even though

Ford owned the patent on a much safer gas tank. For more than eight years, Ford successfully lobbied against a key government safety standard that would have forced the company to change the Pinto's gas tank.

Pinto crashes caused between 500 and 900 burn deaths to people who would not have been seriously injured if the car had not burst into flames. Ford knew the Pinto was a firetrap, yet still paid out[Page 328] millions to settle damage suits out of court, and was prepared to spend millions more lobbying against safety standards. In late models, the bumper was designed to withstand a collision of only about 5 miles per hour (mph). Earlier bumpers offered even less protection to the gas tank.

Internal Ford documents demonstrate that Ford crash-tested the Pinto at a top-secret site more than 40 times, and that every test made at over 25 mph, without special structural alteration of the car, resulted in a ruptured fuel tank. Yet, Ford executives denied under oath having crash-tested the Pinto.

Only three cars passed the test with unbroken fuel tanks. In one of them, an inexpensive lightweight plastic bladder was placed between the front of the gas tank and the differential housing, so four bolts would not pierce the tank. In another successful test, a piece of steel was placed between the tank and the bumper. In the third test car, the gas tank was lined with a rubber bladder. But none of these protective alterations was used in the mass-produced Pinto. When it was discovered the gas tank was unsafe, no one told Ford chief executive Lee Iacocca, who insisted that safety concerns take a back seat putting the car into production, and that the car not weigh over 2,000 pounds or cost more than $2,000. Iacocca feared that adding even $25 more to the car's cost would price the Pinto out of the small-car market.

In June 1978, Ford was forced to recall 1.5 million Ford Pintos and 30,000 Mercury Bobcat sedan and hatchback models. The action was the result of investigations by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's (NHTSA) Office of Defect Investigations. In April 1974, the Center for Auto Safety petitioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to recall Ford Pintos. The Center's petition was based upon reports from attorneys of three deaths and four serious injuries in Pinto accidents. This petition languished in the NHTSA offices until 1977.

In 1977, Mark Dowie of Mother Jones magazine, using documents in the Center files, published an article reporting the dangers of the fuel tank design, and cited internal Ford Motor Company memos proving that Ford knew about the fuel tank problem before the vehicle was produced, but that a cost/benefit memo concluded that it would be “cheaper” for Ford to pay liability for burn deaths and injuries rather than modify the fuel tank to prevent the explosions. Following the publication of Dowie's article, an Orange County, California, jury, awarded Richard Grimshaw $125 million in punitive damages for injuries he suffered as a passenger in a 1971 Pinto struck by another car at 28 mph. The award was reduced to $3.5 million. The jury wanted punitive damages to be more than Ford Motor Company had made in profit on the Pinto ($124 million).

...