U.S. Department of Transportation

With Toyota Motor Company’s quality control, safety and legal problems continuing to worsen, the world’s largest automaker suffered a new setback recently with the announcement that the federal government has hit the company with a huge fine. The Transportation Department recently issued the record $16.4 million fine to the company for hiding a “dangerous defect” and failing to act in a timely manner to alert regulators to safety problems in several of its models. Toyota is reportedly weighing its options and must decide whether to accept the fine, which would amount to admitting that they did something wrong or contesting the fine and taking on even more negative publicity.
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As concern and scrutiny continue to build over the Toyota safety issues that have sparked a massive recall, the U.S. Department of Transportation is bringing in the big guns, asking for help from America’s “astronaut engineers” at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

To date, Toyota has recalled over eight million vehicles, partially in response to reports of sudden or unintended acceleration by Toyota drivers. Recalled vehicles have been involved in injuries and fatalities on the road, and many drivers have yet to see their safety issues addressed even though the company has moved to fix a large portion of vehicles with reinforced brake pedals and other new engineering.

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As new data continues to surface about Toyota, and why many of its recalled cars tend to accelerate out of control, Toyota representatives went before the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Wednesday, Feb. 24. The testimony of Akio Toyoda, the company’s president, and other staff, was the second in two days, as Toyota officials presented to other panels Tuesday, Feb. 23.
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