Injuries Associated With Power Windows
Data obtained since the NPRM confirms the existence of an ongoing problem at a national level. In March 2000, NHTSA responded to questions from some commenters on the NPRM about the justification for the rulemaking by undertaking a review of death certificates from the 50 U.S. States for calendar year 1997. As part of that review, the agency examined three types of non-crash accidents related to motor vehicles, including child (age 10 or younger) fatalities related to vehicle windows. This study was augmented with a search for relevant news articles in the Lexis-NexisTM database, both to confirm cases found in death certificates and to identify additional cases from 1997 and later years.
The study looked at the issue of child fatalities in power window incidents generally, including any fatalities involving vehicle power windows, to obtain an overview of the problem.
A final report, which was published in May 2002,[15] states that in 1997, four deaths of children were associated with vehicle windows, and in two of those cases, it was possible to identify the window system in question as being a power-operated one. In all of those cases, the victims were very young children (three three-year-olds and one four-year-old).
In order to confirm the pattern of injuries discussed above, NHTSA supplemented this research with a similar review of death certificates for calendar year 1998 and updated the Lexis-NexisTM search. The resulting report, which was published in May 2004,[16] yielded the following information.
The results of the review of the 1998 death certificate data were similar to the earlier findings. Four child deaths were recorded as a result of interaction with a vehicle window. Of the four cases, two were identified as involving a power-operated window. In the third case, it was not possible to identify from the death certificate whether the window involved was power-operated, and in the fourth case, no window movement took place, so whether the window was power-operated was not relevant. Victims in those cases were ages two, three (two cases), and six.
As discussed in the second NHTSA report, the results of the updated Lexis-NexisTM search identified 11 child deaths and one injury for calendar years 1998-2002 associated with vehicle windows (one of these deaths involved a sunroof). We concluded that power-operated windows or sunroofs caused nine of the deaths and the one injury. In two cases, it was not possible to identify whether the windows involved in the incident were power-operated. Except for one six-year-old, all of the victims were either age two or three.
These data also indicate that the annual incidence rate for power window-related fatalities involving children is, on average, in the low single digits. However, with such a low rate of occurrence, the number of cases may fluctuate (spike or ebb) in any single year, without necessarily signaling a trend or a generalized change in circumstances. [17]
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http://www.nhtsa.gov/cars/rules/rulings/safety_switch/SaferSwitchesFinalRule.html#V
