Trial Magazine

On a hot August day, a couple was traveling on the highway in their recreational vehicle (RV) when the front right tire blew out. The tire failure caused the RV to lose control and leave the roadway, hitting a tree line. During the crash, the vehicle’s TV came loose from its overhead mounting and hit the female passenger. She sustained a fatal head injury.

Unfortunately, this story is not uncommon. Many RV cases involve the manufacturers’ failure to follow basic safety rules and engineering principles, such as identifying potential risks and hazards associated with reasonably foreseeable uses and misuses of their RVs. It’s important for attorneys to be able to identify potential defects that may arise in RV crashes. Here are two of the most common defects.

Tire Defects

Federal law requires RV manufacturers to permanently affix a label designating the vehicle’s load-carrying capacity on their vehicles.¹ The label must include a load weight that a consumer should never exceed and what a full tank of water will equal as cargo.² Every RV also has a Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR), which is the maximum allowable weight for the vehicle when it is fully loaded with “all passengers, all cargo, fluids, and aftermarket accessories.”³ The GVWR should be compared against the load rating of the tires to ensure the tires are capable of carrying the entire weight. If the tires do not have sufficient load-carrying capacity, this may become an issue in the case.

RV manufacturers and retailers heavily market an RV’s spacious overhead bins and numerous storage compartments, which may encourage consumers to overload them. If evidence of overloading exists, manufacturers may try to use it to avoid liability. Testimony from plaintiffs that they were not warned about the danger associated with overloading can help combat this defense.

Given overloading and the fact that it’s easy to overlook the weight of water, fuel, and propane—which can easily exceed 750 pounds⁴—nearly a quarter of RVs on the road have loads that exceed the capacity their tires can hold.⁵ Excessive weight creates unintended pressure on the tires, especially if the RV sits overweight for long periods of time. Significant overloading can also contribute to certain types of tire failures.⁶

When selecting tires to place on the RV, the manufacturer should consider a safety margin that accounts for the uncertainties of consumer overloading. In fact, it should account for the certainty that most of its RVs will be overloaded at some point. Look online for past consumer complaints about the RV’s tires or any past recalls.

Crashworthiness

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration generally does not crash test Class A and Class C RVs because vehicles over 10,000 pounds are not required to meet seat belt standards.⁷ Some Class B RVs—the smallest of these three classes⁸—do have lap belts or shoulder belts in the dinette and side-seating areas where the seat belt structures are bolted into the floor. However, many of these structures are built from wood, and the cabinets are often made from flimsy materials that can break off and injure people during a crash.⁹

Hire an expert in automotive design to inspect the RV for structural performance. Your expert will be looking to see how the structure of the RV performed during the specific crash sequence and will also evaluate whether the manufacturer could have used an alternative design that would have prevented the injuries. In the case described above, the weak TV structure could have been easily fixed by mounting the TV more securely into the body of the motorhome with a metal bracket.

RVs will continue to be a popular choice with consumers¹⁰ even though the risks are great, and attorneys representing these consumers help expose the hidden dangers.

Other Key Issues

• Make sure the evidence is preserved—that includes the RV and all tires.
• Investigate the history of the RV and the tires by obtaining the vehicle title history, Carfax reports, and any maintenance and service records. Some RVs may be purchased used, so make sure to contact all previous owners to determine whether any abuse or improper maintenance may have occurred.
• Have a tire expert examine the tire in question to determine whether it suffered any abuse before the crash or exhibits any evidence of defects.
• Offer as much evidence as possible about past recalls for the subject RV, whether that recall pertained to any interior RV parts or a defective tire.

Additional Resources

• More information on RVs is available from the RV Safety & Education Foundation (www.rvsafety.com) and the Family Motor Coach Association (www.fmca.com).
• See, e.g., Ratner v. Norcold, Inc., 2011 WL 1789967 (M.D. Tenn. May 10, 2011) (permitting claim against component supplier of the RV’s refrigerator after fire destroyed the vehicle); Miles v. Gen. Tire & Rubber Co., 460 N.E.2d 1377 (Ohio Ct. App. 1983) (reversing a directed verdict for commercial lessor defendant when the plaintiff alleged the RV design was defective and the tires supplied with the RV were inadequate for its load).
• Find past consumer complaints about RV tires or past recalls via the Attorneys Information Exchange Group (www.aieg.com) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (www.nhtsa.gov/recalls).
• AAJ’s Motor Vehicle Collision, Highway and Premises Liability Section (www.justice.org/sections) offers attorneys an online document library, list server, and education and networking opportunities.

Robert E. Ammons is the founding partner of The Ammons Law Firm in Houston. He can be reached at rob@ammonslaw.com.

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