Concerns Over Chrysler Gas Tank "Remedy"
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NEW YORK (CBS NEWS) - About a year and a half ago, Chrysler recalled 1.5 million vehicles over a gas tank issue, but there are still concerns the solution may not go far enough and complaints the company isn't moving fast enough to make the vehicles safer. The fatality numbers rival GM's faulty ignition switch recall.
Regulators called the location of the gas tank a safety risk, because of how it hangs below the rear bumper. If another vehicle crashes into the back, the fuel tank can rupture, resulting in a deadly fire. Government figures put the death toll from deadly fires in the jeeps upwards of 50 people, but safety advocates say that figure is much higher, reports CBS News correspondent Jeff Pegues.
Kayla White, 23, was eight months pregnant with her first child, a boy she'd already named Braden, when her 2003 Jeep Liberty was struck from behind on a Michigan highway.
"My phone rang at one time, my house phone, with zeros all across it and I knew she was gone," Kayla's mother Sue said.
After the crash, the plastic gas tank of her Jeep melted away and witnesses said there was an explosion when the SUV was rear-ended. Kayla died in the fire.
"We don't want it to happen to anybody else," her mother said. "These vehicles need to get off the road and you see them every day and they're oblivious to it. They think, 'We're driving a safe vehicle,' and you're not."
Test after test has shown the potential danger of the rear-mounted fuel tanks in model year 1993-2004 Jeep Grand Cherokees and 2002-2007 Liberties.