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Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Airbags’ Black Boxes ‘Speak Truth’

When someone is injured on a tractor, or two cars crash in an intersection, insurance companies and law firms call Ralph Shirley to figure out what happened – and who’s at fault. In 2009, the engineer founded accident reconstruction firm Test Inc., an acronym for The Evidence Speaks Truth. And the Moorpark company has developed a line of business around airbags. While headlines and press releases talk about massive recalls by automakers for defective airbags, Shirley quietly unlocks the secrets inside the devices using their mini-computers, which record data in five-second increments. From these “tiny black boxes,” knowledgeable technicians like Shirley can discover what happened in the moments before the airbag was deployed, including vehicle and impact speed, whether the brake light switch was on, where the throttle position was and whether the seat belt was in use. “Airbag control modules tell a story about the accident. There are sensors in your car that say, ‘Oh I feel a bump,’ and at that point it (records) that data for five seconds,” said Shirley, 65. “But you have to read that information with situationally appropriate understanding.” For instance, if a vehicle is rammed from the side and gets pushed along the road, the airbag module is not going to pick up on its speed, Shirley explained. “It’s a piece of information that we use, but it’s not the only thing,” he said. Along with airbag module data, there are many puzzle pieces used to reconstruct accidents. Fallen debris can be a key factor. In a case Shirley handled nearly a decade ago, a bus that was driving along Santa Monica Boulevard smashed into a teenager driving a minivan who ran a red light. The van was pitched against the sidewalk. While investigating the accident, Shirley noted the trail of debris that fell from the two vehicles and was able to calculate how far the minivan had been pushed and the deceleration speed of the bus. Of course, not all accidents involve vehicles. In one case Shirley investigated on behalf of his long-time client John Deere Products & Services, the tractor maker in Moline, Ill., a woman’s arm was accidently cut off while she operated a potato digger. She sued John Deere, which had supplied one part of the contraption, because the company that manufactured the potato digger itself was no longer in business. The courts ruled in John Deere’s favor, relying in part on Shirley’s work. “John Deere was no more liable for this act than if you put your hand in the garbage disposal and PG&E would be responsible even though they only provided the power,” Shirley recalled. “The attorney said it was a frivolous lawsuit.” Detective procedural By the time an insurance company, law firm or manufacturer contacts Shirley, typically weeks or months have passed since the accident. That means his investigation relies heavily on information documented by the police and eyewitnesses. Because Shirley has only one employee, an office administrator, he personally averages between 10 and 60 hours on each case, reading witness accounts, depositions, vehicle manuals and police reports. Next, he conducts his own investigation by going to the accident site to take measurements and studying the wrecked vehicles, if they are available. If they aren’t accessible at junkyards or auction houses, Shirley relies on photographs. Sometimes his detailed reconstructions involve some adventure, such as lighting fires. While working on a case that involved an aging tractor that caught fire and sprayed a man with burning gas, Shirley asked the Ventura County Fire Department if he could use their training grounds. “I told them I needed some help starting some fires and they said OK,” Shirley recalled. “I bought a fuel tank similar to the (one on the) old 1963 tractor and we tried to demonstrate what happened. We (determined) that the guy was refueling while he had the engine running.” Shirley also uses forensic animation to help reconstruct accident scenes, which allows his clients to visualize what happened. However, in order to use the visual software, he must gather accurate data to plug into the computer. Daniel Vomhof, forensic scientist and co-owner of Expert Witness Services Inc. in La Mesa, said getting that kind of data is challenging, since specialists usually must rely on others to document the accident scene accurately. “That is the hardest thing – getting good data,” Vomhof said. “If we are lucky, somebody will have taken a photo of the car showing damage or the lack thereof.” Airbag modules are a big help, but obtaining the information recorded on the black boxes can be difficult at times. Though companies including General Motors and Ford Motor Co. have made the airbag modules available to download since the late 1990s, some carmakers are reluctant to release that information. “With companies like Mercedes-Benz you almost have to get a court order to find out what information will be available on the black box. But companies like Chevy and Dodge make that information accessible,” Vomhof explained. After hours of reading, research and on-foot investigation, Shirley writes a report and provides his client a list of conclusions he has reached. The engineer would not disclose exactly how much he charges for his services, but said it ranges from $100 to $1,000 an hour. Jo Anne Deaton, a partner at law firm Rhodes Hieronymus PLLC in Tulsa, Okla., which specializes in insurance litigation and transportation law, said her firm has hired Shirley for two cases. One of them involved an old tractor that was not fitted with a special safety valve that Shirley had invented while working for John Deere. “His testimony about the design of the valve and how it was incorporated into later designs was an important part of the evidence,” she explained. “I have seen experts who appeared to say what their clients wanted them to say and not what they believed to be the truth. Ralph is very honest and forthright.” Accidental career Shirley got into accident reconstruction by mere happenstance. After graduating with a degree in agricultural engineering from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in 1973, Shirley worked for 32 years as a project engineer at John Deere’s Product Engineering Center in in Waterloo, Iowa, designing agricultural equipment. In 1981 he invented a safety device for John Deere tractors. At that time, farmers had a habit of kneeling beneath tractors and using screwdrivers to start aging engines. The technique would bypass the neutral start switch and start the engine, but it sometimes resulted in the tractor rolling over its operator and injuring or even killing him. In response to a stream of claims filed against John Deere, Shirley invented an engagement-override valve that prevented the tractor engine from moving until the operator stepped on the clutch. “You could still start the tractor (with a screwdriver) but it wouldn’t engage or move until you stepped on the clutch pedal,” Shirley said. “That valve got me acquainted with the legal department at Deere.” In 1984, John Deere released the valve to the industry for general use without royalty. Shirley was asked to sit in on a number of legal proceedings to explain why he hadn’t invented the valve sooner and when he recognized how important it was to the industry, he said, he decided not to try and profit from it. Later, the legal department asked Shirley to conduct some accident investigations and by the mid-1980s accident reconstruction became a part of his regular job. In 2004, Shirley moved back to his native California and in 2009 he invested $15,000 in seed capital to start Test Inc. Competing accident reconstruction companies in the region include Rimkus Consulting Group Inc. in Santa Ana, Momentum Engineering Corp. in Tarzana and Expert Reconstruction Company LLC in Santa Barbara. Naomi Tan, business manager at J2 Engineering Inc., a forensic engineering and traffic accident reconstruction firm in Fresno, said statewide competition ranges from sole proprietors to companies with 20 engineers. “There is a large demand for them because a lot of insurance companies need to do their due diligence to protect their clients,” she said. Even though Shirley had to work on building up his clientele once he moved to California, his work at John Deere proved to help attract business. “I had become acquainted with other experts in the field and with the attorneys at Deere, so word-of-mouth became my best recruiting device,” he said.

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