A panel of three federal judges rejected a proposed tire safety regulation yesterday, saying it allowed for too much error.
Two Bush administration agencies have disagreed over how to satisfy a Congressional demand to install tire pressure monitoring systems in cars and light trucks.
One agency, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, was to come up with a rule to comply with the Tread Act, a law passed in 2000 in the wake of the deadly rollover problems experienced by Ford Explorers equipped with Firestone tires.
New Systems Not Required to Work With Replacement Tires, Allow for Dangerous Levels of Underinflation, Groups Say
WASHINGTON, D.C. A new rule requiring auto manufacturers to install tire pressure monitoring systems in new vehicles is flawed, does not meet the requirements set by Congress and would allow for motorists to ride on dangerously underinflated tires, according to a lawsuit filed today.
In a major rebuke to the Bush Administration in a decision issued on August 6, 2003, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit overturned the Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) rule issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) on June 5, 2002. The Court found that the cheaper and less accurate indirect tire pressure monitors were "both contrary to law and arbitrary and capricious" while the more accurate direct tire pressure monitors complied with the Safety Act.
