Misaligned floor mat may have caused calamity

On August 28, 2009, off-duty California Highway Patrol officer Mark Saylor and three members of his family were killed when the 2009 Lexus ES they were riding in sped out of control, crashed into another vehicle, rolled over, and burned. News reports stated that someone in the Lexus called 911 and reported that the car was speeding out of control and that the brakes weren’t working. Initial police reports said that the driver’s floor mat had interfered with the pedals. (Toyota floor mat shown here as an example.)

It was later reported that the Lexus, a dealer loaner car, may have been fitted at the dealership with accessory all-weather floor mats that were too big for that model, and so could not be secured properly to the floor. (See official statement.) It has been speculated that the loose floor mat may have gotten entangled in such a way that the accelerator pedal was pinned down while preventing the brake pedal from being depressed, but the investigation is not complete. The crash is still being investigated by both California authorities and by a team from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. In 2007, Lexus and Toyota issued a floor mat recall due to a problem with the mats potentially getting stuck under the accelerator pedal in certain cars. 
 
Sean Kane, founder of Safety Research & Strategies, Inc., said, “The Toyota Sudden Unintended Acceleration (SUA) problem covers a wide array of models and years -- Camry, Tacoma, Sienna, and Lexus. Floor mat interference can and undoubtedly does cause unintended acceleration, but having reviewed hundreds of complaints, there are incidents that defy floor mat interference as a cause.” (Read the Safety Research & Strategies report.)
 
Whatever the actual sequence of events was that led to this freak accident, having loose carpeting or other items in the driver foot well is probably not so uncommon. This crash vividly illustrates that the worst-case scenario sometimes actually happens. If your car has stock floor mats, take the time to make sure they are hooked to their restraint fixtures, if the car is so equipped. If you have aftermarket or accessory floor mats, make sure they are secured and can’t move around in such away as to interfere with pedal travel. Never stack floor mats; there should be only one per person. And always keep travel trash clear of the driver’s foot well.   

Learn more about safety techologies in our car safety section.

—Gordon Hard

Comments

[ronycoke]

In this situation would it be appropriate to turn off the engine (with the key), being careful not to lock the steering column?

[Cale]

"It has been speculated that the loose floor mat may have gotten entangled in such a way that the accelerator pedal was pinned down while preventing the brake pedal from being depressed,..."

This is a tragedy. As I read about the runaway acceleration I thought in panic, stomp on the brakes, stomp on the brakes! But then read, in horror, that the floor mat was apparently preventing the brake pedal from being depressed. How is this possible?

I read the Toyota news release concerning the accident and they mention "...that the cause may have been an all-weather floor mat from a different Lexus model which, if installed incorrectly in the ES350, could cause it to interfere with the accelerator pedal." There's no mention of brake pedal interference.

The news report said that the 911 caller said, ".. there's no brakes,..." but no mention is made of any speculation about the cause of brake failure.

The accident is surrounded in mystery. There was sufficient time to make a cell phone call to 911 but in that same time an extraordinarily competent member of the California Highway Patrol did not reach down to pull back a floor mat from the foot boards. His professional training would have been in car safety and a obstruction to the pedals would have been a first consideration. And even if confronted with this abberation, shouldn't a 45 year old officer be able to put enough force on the brake pedal to cause it to compress a rubber all-weather floor mat?

Perhaps the brake problem is unrelated to the unintended acceleration problem. Officer Saylor and Lastrella Families are owed a complete investigation of this accident. So little is known about this car (a loaner from the dealership) and it would be a terrible mistake to let the possibility of an unrelated, and potentially far greater problem such as complete brake failure, be missed in a rush to hold the floor mats entirely responsible.

[david]

Very tragic. In high performance driving schools and auto-x events, anything that is not securely attached to the car has to be removed for safety reasons. Floor mats are removed, just to avoid this particular case. I see people driving around all the time with their cars full of stuff (aka junk). In case of accident, those junk can came flying forward and become a projectile, or get stuck under the brake paddle. Cars thought to have more covered storage space.

[David Brodbeck]

ronycoke: I think the best thing to do would be to shift to neutral, then stop by carefully using the parking brake. If you turn off the key, not only do you risk locking the steering, you also disable the power steering, making the car harder to control. Shifting to neutral will probably cause the engine to over-rev, but better to be safe with a blown engine than to end up in a wreck.

[Rich]

There are some interesting bits of information at the link to the news story, particularly that on a Lexus with push-button ignition you need to hold the button down for 3 seconds before the engine will cut.

[E Meyer]

Several comments are along the lines of "Why didn't he just turn off the key"? That car doesn't have a key. How many drivers know what to do in a situation with these new push button ignition cars? Can you even turn it off while its moving?

Looking through the owners manual for my 2009 Infiniti, I see the instruction on how to do this (press the button 3 consecutive times or hold it for more than 2 seconds) is buried in one of the legal warnings (right after "do not test an AWD equipped car on a dynamometer) and does not even rate an entry in the index. I read through the manual when I bought the car, which I think puts me in a small minority of car buyers, but never noticed this instruction until I went looking for it specifically.

[mike]

This is real... it has happened on my Lexus IS250 twice in the past month. Luckly I pulled the pedal up by hand while speeding out of control. I thought I was a remote incident and now see it is a huge issue.

[Prius Driver]

The Prius has the same start button but if you accidentally press it while the car is moving, the engine does stop. Its good to know about the three second rule.

Handling an emergency requires advanced preparation. Two strategies I hope to remember in a runaway vehicle are using the emergency brake and downshifting to a low gear.

[Michael]

Some excellent comments have been posted here, particularly those of Cale, David Brodbeck and E.Meyer. Truly, this is a tragedy. It happened in my neighborhood (Santee, CA) and was witnessed by some of my friends. One thing that I couldn't understand, when I heard the news story, is how an experienced law-enforcement officer could fall prey to such a common problem, especially when the emergency procedures are so cut-and-dried.

I took evasive driving training at the same Ontario, CA facility that many law-enforcement personnel do. In such an event, they teach you to shift to neutral and use your parking brake. They also teach you to use your front wheels as brakes in the event that your braking system is compromised. As a last-ditch strategy, you can steer into an obstacle--at a glancing angle--to gradually wear down your momentum. This is sort of a jury-rig version of a runaway truck deceleration ramp.

Given that the driver was an off-duty police officer, and that he must--at minimum--have had the same training I did (I am not a law-enforcement officer; I was a chauffeur at the time of my training), he undoubtedly knew these things. Why did he not do them? Something more must have been going on. POs are trained to think rationally under stress in life-and-death situations. This was no simple case of a stuck pedal.

[Doug]

I think the 3-second delay feature of the Start/Stop ignition button is a colossal design error. It is not a salient point in the owner's manual, so most people would miss it even if they did read the manual -- which most people don't. Having a 3-second delay in the Start/Stop ignition button removes control of that function for anyone not familiar with the feature (probably 95% of owners), and nobody should have to read an owner's manual to find out how to turn the ignition off -- especially at 120mph in a runaway vehicle.

After the tragic accident involving officer Saylor and his family members, I tested both of my own vehicles and that's how I discovered the 3-second delay when the vehicle is in motion -- even at just a few mph. I also discovered my wife's new Toyota Highlander did not even come with hooks installed on the driver's side mat, and the hooks in my Avalon were not hooked into the mat after a recent service at the dealership. Absolutely everyone affected by this issue need to either remove their driver-side floor mats or at least inspect them for proper installation on a regular basis until we have a fix from Toyota.

I have checked with several factory technicians at Toyota, and all assure me there is no automatic lockout feature in the shift linkage on any Toyota or Lexus, so I don't know why Saylor didn't or was unable to move the shift lever into neutral -- or downshift to low, which would have at least kept the speed down. Given his training and experience, I must assume he was unable to do it for some reason and this aspect should receive serious attention in the investigation.

As an aside, most or all newer vehicles have a rev limiter, so over-revving would not be a problem even if the vehicle was shifted into neutral with the accelerator stuck. Besides, that would be the least of your problems in a situation like that.

I would like part of the fix from Toyota/Lexus to be a removal of the 3-second delay in the Start/Stop button.

[Loran Stringer]

Perhaps crash training on a simulator should be a normal part of citizen drivers training. At a minimum everyone should know how anti lock brakes feel when working properly in an emergency stop.

[Kris]

I experienced a stuck accelerator problem on my Celica several years ago. The cause was not due to a floor mat but due to a mechanic who had placed the accelerator cable out of his way while working on the engine. When I got into the car after he was finished I pulled out onto the highway and gradually increased speed. After a short time I realized I was still going faster even though I had pulled my foot back from the pedal. Immediately I put my foot under the pedal and tried to pull back with no result. Applying the brakes only barely slowed me down.

Now approaching a major intersection with a red light, I recognized the potential outcome was not good for me or anyone else in front of me. I thought turning off the engine would lock the steering so I put the gear into neutral and steered somewhat violently into a gas station at the corner of the intersection. I was praying I could stop and not hit anyone or anything. Fortunately I did come to a stop and the attendant ran over to the car which was now screaming at high revs. I turned the engine off and he opened the hood. He waved me out to see the cable stretched up and over a piece of the engine compartment and caught in place. He released it and when I restarted the car it seemed to act normally. But at that point I was shaking so hard I was not going to drive it. I called the dealer who did the work on the car and they sent the mechanic down the road to drive my car back to check it out.

Needless to say I still have nightmares about that experience. But I did learn later that when you turn off the engine it is actually done in two steps. The first click counterclockwise does stop the engine but you still have electrical power to keep the steering. It is the second click that turns off the power and locks the steering wheel.

[Mike]

Although having a floor mat or other object pressing on the gas pedal is a serious problem, I have heard that there may be another cause. My 2009 Toyota Camry has a transmission problem in the 30 to 40 mph range. It drags when I try to coast, and jerk forward as it slows down. I have tried to have this investigated by Toyota, twice, and was told this is normal. I was also told that if the computer does not log a problem, there cannot be a problem. Basically the mechanics seem to have been trained to fix only what the computer tells them is a problem. This may be why Toyota is only considering the floor mat as the problem.

[Tony]

I tested the power button in driveway @ 10-15 mph in drive. If your moving do not push the power button it lock's up the brake's do not used the power button. Move the drive to N. If motor blow's up better than a life. AFTER STOP TURN POWER OFF

[Joanne Baker]

I have a 2008 Toyota Scion XB. Last night I encountered the problem of increased aceleration and had a hard time braking. My husband took our car to the Toyota dealer today. They checked it over and said there was nothing wrong with it. I don't feel safe driving it anymore. What do I do?