Editorial: Ford’s lead should be followed

Friday, Aug. 18, 2000 | 10:01 a.m.

It is encouraging that Ford Motor Co. is exploring options to quickly replace what are potentially faulty Firestone tires made for the automaker's sport utility vehicles. In an interview with USA Today, Ford Motor CEO Jacques Nasser said Wednesday that "spring is unacceptable" as the goal for replacing the tires. In addition, Nasser said the company is exploring a number of ways to remove from the road these potentially dangerous tires, which the federal government believes have been responsible for 62 deaths. Ford is considering paying for rental cars for those customers who are too concerned to wait for replacement tires. Ford also may send to customers tires that were intended for new SUVs, even if it requires a delay in shipping new models to dealers.

Firestone, the maker of the tire, in contrast has been excruciatingly slow to respond to the crisis. Its staggered recall, in which just four states are taken care of first -- California, Florida, Arizona and Texas -- is ludicrous. The tire maker said it wanted to help first those states with the most incidences of tires separating. But since hot weather is believed to be a culprit in the tire blowouts, it's wrong that Nevada and other hot-weather states are reduced to second-class status.

Indeed, California may have more Ford SUVs, but its largely temperate climate in no way matches Nevada's blistering weather. That's why Nevada Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa has threatened to sue Firestone unless it bumps Nevada into the first tier of states. Las Vegans saw firsthand last weekend what can happen here when Clark County School Board President Mary Beth Scow's Firestone tire separated on her Ford Explorer, causing it to crash before it landed upside down. Luckily for Scow, no one in her vehicle was seriously hurt.

Meanwhile, there are suggestions that federal regulators didn't quickly address the issue when they were first apprised. State Farm contended Wednesday that as far back as July 1998 the insurer had notified the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of an unusually high number of claims involving Firestone tire failures during the past six years. And for that matter, while Ford is acting aggressively now, there have been accusations that the company was slow to respond when it first learned of the possibility of tire separation in its SUVs. This appears to be a case where everyone has dropped the ball, from start to finish.