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Tragic Indifference: One Man's Battle with the Auto Industry over the Dangers of SUVs | 
 enlarge | Author: Adam Penenberg
Publisher: Collins Business
Category: Book
List Price: $25.95
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You Save: $25.94 (100%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  17 reviews
Sales Rank: 862812
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9.2 x 6.4 x 1.2
ISBN: 0060090588
Dewey Decimal Number: 346.73038
EAN: 9780060090586
ASIN: 0060090588
Publication Date: November 1, 2003
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Condition: Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Shipped to over one million happy customers! Your purchase benefits world literacy!
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Tragic Indifference is the gut-wrenching account of the biggest product liability case in history: the Ford-Firestone fiasco, where delaminating Firestone tires caused Ford Explorers to lose control and crash at highway speeds. The result was a massive recall, consumer panic, and congressional hearings. It all culminated in a lawsuit that would become a watershed for all future auto safety lawsuits. In February 2000, reports began to surface of an alarming number of rollover cases involving Ford Explorers traveling on Firestone's Wilderness AT tire. As the stories drove a national frenzy of news coverage, no one seemed to know what was causing the devastation. Until one lawyer, who had been campaigning for years to get Ford to acknowledge the dangerous flaws in the design of the Explorer -- an engineering flaw greatly exacerbated by the use of Firestone's tires -- stepped forward to demand that Ford executives take responsibility for the lethal design of their trucks. More than a courtroom drama, Tragic Indifference reveals the web of individual stories beneath the national headlines. Weaving together harrowing depictions of the accidents and their consequences with the stories of the men and women who labor to police the auto industry and its reckless cost-cutting, Tragic Indifference will transform the way you view the government, the courts, and the media. Above all, this book shows the price the public pays in wrecked and mangled lives when companies focus more on shaving costs than making quality products. At the center of the story is Tab Turner, a charismatic trial attorney from Arkansas, who has made a career out of forcing Ford and other automakers to own up to their unsafe practices and to admit that they knowingly trade human lives for profits. Given the almost complete lack of government regulation over the auto industry, Turner has become, in essence, the court of last resort for victims of callous auto companies. Tragic Indifference also recounts the struggles of Turner's client Donna Bailey, a single mother and outdoor enthusiast who led troubled teens on backpacking trips, as she fought back from the brink of death to confront those ultimately responsible for her accident. Her case became a benchmark for all others that followed.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 12 more reviews...
 The indifference of Ford and Firestone to death. January 10, 2006
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I liked this book. I think it damns Firestone and Ford's policies of good manufacturing standards and design. I think it leans too heavily toward the lawyers and customers on this book, but it is evident these manufacturers did not have the best interests of the consumer in mind. It also paints the plaintiff's lawyers as do gooders, when most of these people are getting 40% of their clients settlements.
The Ford SUVs were clearly dangerous cars that should have been redesigned in their early product lifecycles. What Ford did by specifying a 26 PSI in the tires offset the stability problem and created another more serious problem. The friction these tires went through at the lower PSI resulted in tread separation. Throw in poor manufacturing standards and you have a situation that caused 300 deaths. The author should be commended for writing a readable account of what happened.
Since I worked for a tire manufacturer (Uniroyal-Goodrich), I found the explanation of tread separation rather simplistic. The author should have consulted a tire engineer rather than tire builders in detailing what effects tack has on a tire. Also lacking was what Firestone took out to reduce the tire weight. More detail needed to go into why the tires were unsafe, rather than just saying it was old rubber or not enough material.
Overall, this was a good book about poor manufacturing design and standards. If these companies really believed that Quality was Job 1, they would not have manufactured and sold these products.
 an excellent account July 24, 2004
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
Penenberg's account of Ford and Firestone and the battle to illuminate their malfeasance is driven by a transparent passion for justice. It is impossible not to become angered by the equally transparent desire of both corporations to put profits ahead of the wellbeing of the people who were killed or maimed by their products. It's not a new story in that regard, but this one is told so well, with such thorough research and excellent writing, that it ranks with the best of the genre. This is a fine fine book.
 Passionate telling of the Explorer rollover issue January 13, 2004
8 out of 10 found this review helpful
It is heart rending to read about the lives torn apart in these horrible accidents. Mr. Penenberg writes effectively and persuasively about the pain, loss, and struggle of those injured as well as the pain and struggle of their loved ones. However, his emotional style, while effective in producing sympathetic emotions, in the end undermines the case he is trying to make. Not that the case is necessarily wrong. It is just that he does not really prove it beyond an emotional conviction.
He does not use his journalistic detachment to let both sides speak and let the preponderance of the evidence fall where it may. The author wants to convince us that Ford is wrong (and I am not saying they are or aren't) and that the lawyers are good. A couple of examples about the lawyers: Early in the book he introduces Tab Turner has having a private jet, but not a flashy one - the author calls it a Plymouth with wings. A few pages later he reveals it to be a Cessna Citation. This is a very nice jet and Turner is a very very rich man who for all his protestations of not caring about fees gathers them by the truckload. And it isn't until the second half of the book that we are shown the fighting over fees and the skullduggery in getting the client to unwittingly sign a new contingency fee arrangement without her healthy caregivers around. It is sickening.
But we all love our own lawyers when they help and protect us (as we should), and we think the other guy's lawyers are scum (unless they lose). That is the way it goes. And friends eventually become targets of suits in the name of justice. Again, it is hard to take, but it happens.
I believe that the book would have been stronger if he would have actually presented both sides of this issue fairly and completely. While the emotions of the case would then be a bit more confused, the reader would be better equipped to make a fair and clearer judgment about the case rather than the one the author wants you to make.
We all despise corporate decisions that expose people to death and injury to save a few dollars or because of carelessness and callous disregard. But we also despise attorneys making huge fees from tragically injured clients and stepping on endless numbers of people, justice, and truth to claim those fees. It isn't that this is a bad book. Rather, it could have been stronger by being more objective. Almost certainly, Ford and Firestone would not have been very forthcoming for interviews. However, when I was reading I kept hoping for more complete information about the accidents from multiple perspectives. The book is worth reading if you are interested in this story, but I could have used less direction from the author on how I was supposed to feel and more information about the facts - not just the defense lawyers' arguments.
truly good reporting, terrifying subject! January 8, 2004
3 out of 6 found this review helpful
I have always thought of Penenberg as the Michael Moore ("Bowling For Columbine", etc.) of investigative reporters/authors. He really, truly knows how to write page-turning revelations on his subjects (in this case, he's moved from the Stephen Glass case, to the auto industry) which are informative WITHOUT sacrificing style.
Sharp-edged Page Turner January 2, 2004
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
Penenberg deserves congratulations for taking a story that could have been as dull as a stretch of Kansas highway and telling it so well it's hard to put the book down. The facts are all there, but the author has taken the time to lay them out artfully and judiciously. This has been an entertaining and elucidating read.
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