GM Announces Kits to Help Prevent Child Deaths in Trunks
17 December 1998
GM Announces Kits to Help Prevent Child Deaths in Trunks
WARREN, Mich.--Dec. 16, 1998--General Motors will offer child-resistant trunk kits for most of its 1990 and newer family passenger cars engineered in the United States. The dealer-installed trunk kits will be available through GM dealers early next year."GM wants to help prevent tragedies like those that claimed 11 young lives this past summer," said Ron Zarrella, executive vice president of General Motors and president of GM North America. "So we will soon begin offering child-resistant kits through our dealers that will help prevent trunk lids from unintentionally closing on children and also provide a means of escape in the event that children do become entrapped in a trunk."
The kit will contain a modified trunk latch -- a trap-resistant latch -- that requires a lever to be manually reset before the trunk lid will close. The manual reset is easily operated by adults standing outside the car, but requires a level of dexterity that most very young children do not possess.
The dealer-installed kits also contain an escape handle, mounting hardware and lighting that will allow the escape handle to be seen more easily by young children who may become trapped in a trunk. The final feature in the kit is a strap to prevent children from entering the trunk from the passenger compartment (for vehicles that have a pass-through into the trunk from the passenger compartment).
Late in the summer of 1998, GM contacted the National SAFE KIDS Campaign to obtain information about previous child entrapment incidents. National SAFE KIDS Campaign began to collect statistics to learn more about the circumstances involving children of various ages who have become entrapped in the trunks of passenger cars. GM also began a behavioral research program, with experimental psychologists and biomechanical experts at Exponent/Failure Analysis Associates. The research program was designed to determine what kind of trunk release mechanism children could identify, touch and be capable of operating after suddenly discovering they are trapped in a very dark and unfamiliar environment.
"We tested a number of designs, found that many that our research team intuitively thought would be successful, didn't work well at all. The majority of children we tested could operate the escape release handle we ultimately developed," said Zarrella. "However, not all the children were successful, particularly the younger ones. That is why we quickly changed our focus from an escape handle to a preventative measure. We designed the child-resistant latches to make it difficult for a young child to latch the trunk in the first place. We are also reviewing actions that might be appropriate to educate our customers and the general public that motor vehicles are not toys or acceptable play areas for children. Young children need to be properly buckled into appropriate car seats and safety belts and never left unattended in a motor vehicle or allowed to play around a vehicle."
"GM will share its behavioral research with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the industry to help prevent these senseless tragedies," added Zarrella. "For example, in our research, we found that children were reluctant to touch some lighted items because they feared the items might be hot."
"Because it is more important to get good safety designs into consumer use, GM will share its escape handle and trap-resistant latch designs with the industry," added Zarrella. "We hope this will encourage other vehicle manufacturers to move quickly to also help prevent future tragedies."
The kits will cost $50. "General Motors will not profit from the sale of these kits," concluded Zarrella. "GM wants to make the kits affordable for our customers, so GM will be underwriting much of the cost when parts become available early in 1999."
