Toyota waited to issue ’05 recall

May 11, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Associated Press

MIAMI

Toyota waited nearly a year in 2005 to recall trucks and SUVs in the United States with defective steering rods, despite issuing a similar recall in Japan and receiving dozens of reports from American motorists about rods that snapped without warning, an Associated Press investigation has found.

The lengthy gap between the Japanese and U.S. recalls — strikingly similar to Toyota’s handling of the recent recall for sudden acceleration problems — triggered a new investigation Monday by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which could fine the automaker up to $16.4 million. That was the amount Toyota paid last month in the acceleration case.

“Our team is working to obtain documents and information from Toyota to find out whether the manufacturer notified NHTSA within five business days of discovering a safety defect in U.S. vehicles,” NHTSA Administrator David Strickland said in a statement.

Federal regulators “are taking this seriously and reviewing the facts to determine whether a timeliness investigation is warranted,” NHTSA spokeswoman Karen Aldana told the AP in response to questions about the 2005 recall. An automaker is required to notify NHTSA about a defect within five days of determining one exists.

NHTSA has now linked 16 crashes, three deaths and seven injuries to the steering rod defect. When a steering rod snaps, the driver cannot control the vehicle because the front wheels will not turn.

The AP reviewed hundred of pages of documents, including many of Toyota’s internal communications from the period when the steering problems first emerged.