Woman died inside burning SUV that started 'going crazy'; doors wouldn't unlock

[milestogo]

Returning home along a snow-lined road last month, 73-year-old Mary Frahm had just dropped off her son for work when her car started acting bizarrely — the dashboard lights were flashing, the windshield wipers started up on their own, the speedometer was "going crazy" and the vehicle was losing power.

After pulling over on Highway AB in the town of Dunn, the McFarland resident phoned her fiancé to report that her 2009 Dodge Journey was "acting up" again, an occasional electrical problem with the vehicle she'd owned the past four years. This time, though, she couldn't unlock the doors, even with her key fob, and the windows wouldn't roll down, according to a Dane County sheriff's report.

En route to help her, Frahm's fiancé got another call from Frahm, this one more urgent. Smoke was now seeping out of the dashboard, and she could smell burning, the report stated. He told her to call 911, which she did. But before first responders had arrived at the scene, flames had engulfed the vehicle, with Frahm still locked inside. The Dane County medical examiner declared Frahm dead at the scene but has not released a cause of death in the Dec. 9 incident.

Frahm "babied" her car, including staying on top of its standard maintenance, her fiancé told a sheriff's officer on the scene. An investigation revealed that the vehicle had a Totally Integrated Power Module, or TIPM, a part installed in some older Chrysler vehicles that has been in the crosshairs of an auto safety group and litigation but deemed safe by federal authorities. fed the vehicle, with Frahm still locked inside.

https://madison.com/news/local/woman-died-inside-burning-suv-that-started-going-crazy-doors-wouldnt-unlock/article_b6ec9bff-c160-5132-bcdf-91ed21766008.html

Terrifying.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

1. That's horrible.

Everyone should have one of those window hammer/seatbelt cutter tools in their cars where they can reach it.

[Kaleva]

2. Good advice

[milestogo]

10. And reasonably priced on Amazon.

[tblue37]

8. You can pull up the headrest on the driver's seat and use its metal bars to break out a window.

[Emile]

17. Thanks for the reminder!

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

29. good to know

[ananda]

22. Just ordered one.

I didn't know about those till now.

[milestogo]

24. Me neither.

And here I am thinking a blanket, jumper cables, a shovel, and a scraper are all I need. I will order one today.

[ThoughtCriminal]

34. I keep one in the driver-side door pocket.

Immediately available and always in the same place. If you need it, you don't want to search.

[hlthe2b]

3. Everyone should carry a window-breaker in their car...

If you are unaware, it is a smallish device designed to smash a window in the event of an accident landing the vehicle in water or upside down in frozen terrain (or a vehicle fire).

Mine came as part of a special tool kit from Swiss Army (not your standard knife set)
But, there are lots of options and they are not expensive. Keep it in your center console.

[lostnfound]

4. AAA: 2 of 3 hammer type don't work; and laminated glass won't break at all

https://www.cars.com/articles/tough-break-laminated-windows-could-make-it-hard-to-escape-your-car-405870/

I wondered whether most elderly people would be strong enough to use the device to break a window. Turns out we all ya have a problem if windows are laminated.

The study tested six vehicle escape tools; three were spring-loaded and three were hammer style. Spring-loaded tools, which release a sharp head at a high speed when you pull the trigger, passed all tests on tempered glass. Only one of the tools failed one of three attempts to break the window. The hammer-style tools, which require you to swing and hit the glass with the sharp head, were less successful. Two of the three tools tested failed all attempts to break tempered glass windows.
…
AAA’s study found that while four of the six tested tools cracked the laminated glass, none broke it in a way that would allow someone to escape a sinking or burning vehicle.

[Shellback Squid]

5. side windows are not laminated on almost all cars, windshields are laminated though

[lostnfound]

28. Not true. Very many are, per Bluebassman's post #9: Volvo, Mercedes, Taurus, Audi, BMW, ...

Lots of them
https://www.aaa.com/AAA/common/AAR/files/Laminated-Glass-Vehicle-List.pdf

[hlthe2b]

6. THis is a video of the device I have that firefighters often carry as well:

This device likewise includes two tools to cut through the rubber on a windshield to remove portions as well. While I haven't tested it myself, a friend of mine HAS tested out the seatbelt cutter. And if the video is to be believed, I feel comfortable that the other tools would work as designed. Anecdotally volunteer firefighter friends say they do and are much more readily accessible than the heavy-duty equipment they obviously also have available.

[hlthe2b]

7. How to tell if your side windows are laminated or tempered glass:

https://info.glass.com/laminated-vs-tempered-car-side-windows/
Does Your Car Have Laminated Side Windows?

Identifying whether your car or truck has laminated side windows is generally fairly simple. You’ll just need to locate the “bug” which is a small stamp, typically in the lower corner of the glass. The bug is silk-screened onto the glass permanently and lists pertinent information about the glass such as the manufacturer, codes that describe the glass, and either the word “laminated” or “tempered”. If you can’t find the bug on your car’s glass, there’s another easy way to identify if it’s laminated or tempered. Simply roll down your car’s window halfway and inspect the top edge of the glass. Laminated glass is a sandwich of two pieces of glass with an interlayer in the middle, and this layering can usually be observed along the edge. In contrast, layering will not be visible along the edge of a piece of tempered glass. It will appear as a completely smooth, single piece.

If you still unsure you can drive by your local windshield replacement/glass specialist store and have them look at it. Apparently most windows are tempered glass today, though windshield may be laminated.

[Maru Kitteh]

35. I LOVE how DU is full of practical, valuable, accurate information we can all use.

Thank you for this excellent material!

[Disaffected]

11. Another reason not to buy

a Cybertruck.

[bluesbassman]

9. Surprised to learn that there are quite a few vehicles with laminated non-windshield glass.

Here’s a list from AAA.
https://www.aaa.com/AAA/common/AAR/files/Laminated-Glass-Vehicle-List.pdf

[hlthe2b]

12. Yes. But see my post#7 to tell for sure.

[intheflow]

13. This is why it took me until 2016 to get a car with electric windows.

I would still much rather have windows that manually roll down but it's getting impossible to find those cars, even used ones.

[William Seger]

18. I've never owned one; I just don't trust them or electric locks

Yeah, maybe I'm a bit of a Luddite on some things -- I've never owned a car with an automatic transmission, either.

[SheltieLover]

14. Twice I've rented Dodge Caravans & they locked a person in. Fiat Chrysler JUNK!

I had a med appt & (adult) grandson waited in car. When I got out, he had been locked inside & interior temp was 154 degrees F! Fortunately, the heat didn't bother him, but neither of us were happy about this!

Returned immediately & they listened, then rented it right back out.

How the hell can selling junk like this be legal?

[milestogo]

16. That's horrible.

I can't imagine being locked in a vehicle and unable to get out. But I've always thought that situation happens if a car goes underwater. Never dreamed you could be locked in and go up in flames.

[SheltieLover]

19. Yes it was. No mechanical knob to unlock doors!

Be very careful if you rent or buy a new vehicle to ensure it has mechanical door lock releases!

I've also rented 2 different Chrysler 200s in the past few years, both of which kept warning me while driving that the emergency brake system needed to be checked. Imagine running down the interstate at 70 mph & having Fiat Chrysler's junk car throw the electronic emergency brake on!

Fiat Chrysler junk!

I love my 2000 Dodgd Stratus, but this Fiat junk is beyond surreal!

Be safe!

[appalachiablue]

15. K/R Thanks for sharing.

[electric_blue68]

20. Omg like a SF Horror movie! TY hlthe2b for the safety knife vid.

...now I'll bug my cousins about getting one!

[ForgedCrank]

21. This is

a horrible thing to hear, but there is a technical issue here, or some information is still missing.
All car inside handles have a mechanical connection to the latch release and the lock for this very reason.
Simply pulling on the inside door handle will unlock the door as well as release the latch. The exception to this are the rear doors that have a child safety system that you can use to disconnect this linkage.
So unless this vehicle was somehow damaged both electrically and physically at the same time, all she should have had to do was pull the handle.
I'm sure she very likely did this, as anyone else would in a desperate situation like this, so I really would like to see the results of the investigation when it concludes.

[Hekate]

23. The car is a computer. There apparently is no manual override -- to anything?

The car is a computer. When the one on your desk goes haywire — you unplug it, for starters. Then you plug back in and reboot. Rebooting can take quite some time, depending on how corrupted the system got. But you don’t die.

But we are driving computers.
And we are being sold on self-driving computers.



.

[Hekate]

25. My niece and her husband own a Tesla SUV, of which status symbol they are mighty proud....

Last month, basically one month ago, they excitedly showed us the Tesla holiday light and music show that had been automatically downloaded to their car.

You read my previous post about driving a computer, I hope. This did not make me or my husband feel festive.

It wasn’t the wretched excess, it was the automatic long distance download of something that made their car blast music to the neighborhood, put on a light show, windows roll up and down, trunk open and shut, and unless I was hallucinating, bounce up and down like a low-rider on parade.

Really? What do you do in the middle of a freeway when THAT goes fratz?

[milestogo]

27. That is crap.

I don't need inanimate objects making choices for me.

And you're right - we are driving computers. Which is why a replacement key costs $300.

[SYFROYH]

26. Counter intuitively, the corners of car windows are more vulnerable than the center

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

30. reminds me of the guy whose car locked him inside on a hot day. He died.

horrible.

[mzmolly]

31. Horrible

[ProfessorGAC]

32. Something Missing In This Story

This was a Dodge, hence Chrysler.
I have been driving Chryslers since 1982.
In every one I had, the door mechanism automatically unlocks the door when you pull on the door handle.
Nothing electrical or electronic. The inside door lever is connected to the lock rod.
There is no need to unlock the door to get out.
Admittedly, I've only had LeBarons, Sebring & now a 200, not a minivan. But, my soundman's Town & Country worked the same as any of mine.
Seems like there's something else going on here. A broken door mechanism, perhaps?

[milestogo]

37. I'm sure they'll do a full investigation.

[ProfessorGAC]

39. No Doubt

But, there's still more to it than "the doors wouldn't unlock".

[ecstatic]

38. So I was curious about this horrific story

At first I assumed it was due to an unfortunate error of thinking the only way out was through the automatic lock button. But it seems that the issues with the 2009 journey are well documented with people complaining about door and lock issues. From the pictures, it looks like it has the old school stick lock that goes up and down right near the windows. I don't know how far down it goes when locked but that may have posed an issue when trying to manually unlock it. I have no idea.

I've never owned a Dodge, but I think almost all of my cars have been able to open from the inside without even unlocking first.

[ProfessorGAC]

40. My Wife's Car...

....needs to be unlocked physically, but the lock know doesn't go all the way into the door, so could be grabbed.
Even in that case, one is not dependent on the electrical locks.

[milestogo]

41. There was a recall, but the VIN number of this vehicle was never on the list.

Seems like something major was overlooked.

[LudwigPastorius]

33. Vehicles with electronic door releases are required to have manual emergency levers.

Unfortunately, she didn't know where it was when she needed it.

https://www.consumerreports.org/car-safety/how-to-escape-your-car-if-the-electronic-door-release-fails-a8152892189/

Your owner’s manual will tell you where to find the mechanical lever and how to use it. Give it a try. An actual emergency is not the time to figure it out.

[ecstatic]

36. What the f...? nt

[NutmegYankee]

44. Some cars have an electronic door release button, instead of an interior handle

Cars designed like this must have an emergency release pull/lever hidden away, but many drivers never read the car manual to make themselves aware of these things. It's similar to the override on the drivers door handle that allows you to enter a car where the keyless unlock system has failed.

[helpisontheway]

42. I have one of the window breakers because we live by a lot of water

I want to be able to break out in case something happens on one of the bridges. However, this is another scenario that I did not consider. I purchased our window breakers on Amazon a few years ago. I purchased some as stocking stuffers for our sons.

[milestogo]

43. I ordered one yesterday.

I guess it could also be a good thing to have on hand if you see a small child or a dog left in a sealed up car.