Ford Compensates Family of Oklahoma Man Killed by Defective Pickup

Ford will pay those surviving an Oklahoma man, 62, who was killed when the 2007 F150 he was driving was involved in a frontal crash. While major damage was caused to the pickup in the crash, the man’s front air bag did not deploy. Because of this failure of the F150’s supplemental restraint system, the man suffered traumatic injuries that resulted in his death.

In bringing claims against Ford, Rob Ammons claimed that the F150’s front air bag was defective and unreasonably dangerous because it did not deploy when it clearly needed to. The air bag’s goal of injury prevention or mitigation could not be achieved without deployment. According to Ammons, the likely reason the air bag did not deploy was that impact sensors required to trigger deployment of the air bag were not included in a sufficient number and at properly strategic positions on the pickup.

Ammons claimed Ford knew well in advance of designing the 2007 F150 — and had disseminated such knowledge within the company — that having five crash sensors would reduce risk of non-deployment. The sensors would be placed on each front fender, on top of the radiator support and under the instrument panel. Ford failed to follow its own advice, however, and equipped the 2007 F150 with only one impact sensor. That negligent decision proved fatal here when failure of an air bag to deploy took the life of a beloved family man and left his wife and children devastated.

The Ammons Law Firm has a nationwide personal injury practice focusing on tire defects, truck accidents, rollovers, consumer protection and product liability, catastrophic injury, wrongful death, post-collision fires, seat belt defects, air bag defects and plant explosions.