Opinion ID: 771335
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: the challenged expert testimony.

Text: 39
40 Noettl, the accident reconstruction/design engineer, was to testify that the truck was defectively designed. 13 Noettl's proffered testimony is contained in a preliminary report dated June 16, 1997; an amended report dated December 4,1997; an affidavit dated September 23, 1998; and two depositions. 41 In his preliminary report, Noettl opined that the truck Oddi was driving 42 rode up on the guard rail because of the failure of the left side of the front bumper.... Had the bumper not significantly deformed back and inward the vehicle would have been deflected by the guard rail. 43 It is also my opinion that the floor board allowed intrusion by the guard rail and possibly the concrete barrier into the occupant compartment in the area near the brake pedal and where the driver's feet and legs would be located. This intrusion was a direct cause of the injuries to Mr. Oddi. 44 Had the bumper and the floor board been properly structurally designed the vehicle would not have gone over the guard rail and the occupant compartment would not have been intruded by the guard rail and concrete barrier. App. at 104-105. 45 After he reviewed the deposition of defense expert Donald Edelen, Noettl submitted an amended report, dated December 4, 1997. In it he stated: 46 It is my opinion that [Ford] should have warned [Grumman] of the fact that the front bumper on their chassis is for decorative trim only and will not offer protection to the body and occupant in a collision. As a result of the design of the chassis and bumper, the front wheels of the vehicle become exposed in foreseeable accident situations. Ford should have specifically warned that the bumper was extremely weak due to the fact that it had no backing plate or brackets for reinforcement and because it had holes in the bumper placed immediately adjacent to the outside where the bumper mounted to the chassis. 47      48 Neither Ford nor Grumman conducted any testing that involved the vehicle impacting with guardrails. Neither Ford nor Grumman incorporated any design(s) into the chassis or body of the vehicle that would prevent or reduce the likelihood of the vehicle going over a guardrail in the event of an impact with a guardrail. Due to the vehicle's height, weight, and design the vehicle as a propensity to ramp up onto the guardrail in foreseeable collision situations. 14 .. This design defect caused or contributed to the cause of the accident and to Mr. Oddi's injuries. 49 App. at 100-01. 50 In response to summary judgment motions, in which Ford and Grumman noted certain deficiencies in Noettl's submissions, Noettl prepared an affidavit which Oddi's counsel attached to Oddi's response to the summary judgment motions. That affidavit is dated September 23, 1998, and reads, in relevant part: 51 1. Given the basic design of this vehicle, the following is a description of alternative designs that in my opinion, would have (1) prevented the Oddi vehicle from ramping the guard rail and (2) prevented the intrusion which occurred of structural components into the occupant compartment. 52 A. A reinforced bumper. The bumper on the subject vehicle had a measured 3.5 X 6.5 inches holes at critical stress points next to the frame rails to which the bumper is attached. The holes were designed and manufactured by the bumper manufacturer. The bumper should have been reinforced at these points by eliminating the holes and/or welding inch to inch steel reinforcement wedges between the frame rails and the upper and lower edges of the back side of the bumper. 53 B. Steel brackets should have been welded to the... back side of the upper and lower edges of the back of the bumper. 54 C. The bending and tensile properties and or metal thickness of the bumper should have been increased in addition to A or B as described above. 55 D. Various bumper configurations such as tubular or cylinder designs should have been manufactured and tested in addition to A, B, and C above. These bumper configurations are stronger than flat bumpers with similar metal characteristics. 56 E. The occupant compartment should be reinforced by increasing the bending and tensile properties and metal thickness (by.125 inch increments) in the area of the floorboard and fire wall and\or by welding or forming ribbing to the metal in this area. Safety factors of fifty or hundred percent are common in products. 57 2. I have observed bracket and wedge bumper reinforcements on similar vehicles. As to metal thickness -- the steering components on the subject vehicle were protected by a measured.35 inch (approximately) thick steel enclosure while the bumper on this vehicle was designed to be.208 inch thick-- a difference of approximately .142 inch. 58 3. Guard rails of this type are common in road way design and vehicle encounters of the type that happened with the Oddi vehicle should be expected by manufacturers. 59 4. The design changes I have described were capable of being incorporated into the design and manufacture of this truck in 1976 using basic engineering design and manufacturing techniques. 60 5. The design changes I have described would not interfere with the function or intended use of the truck. 61 6. In my opinion the above design changes would have greatly increased bumper strength and occupant compartment protection with very little total incremental vehicle manufacturing cost. 62 7. It is my opinion that if the design changes described above were incorporated into the manufacturing process of the Oddi vehicle it would not have ramped on to the guard rail and would not have experiences sudden deceleration from striking the bridge abutment. This would have prevented the intrusions into the occupant compartment and the significant injury which Mr. Oddi sustained. 63 App. at 123-24. 64 In one of his depositions, Noettl testified that he based the opinions contained in his June 16, 1997 preliminary report in part on a review of accident reports, photographs, witnesses' statements, Oddi's medical records, and Oddi's deposition testimony; and in part on his own [Noettl's] experience, academic training, andresearch that [he does] almost on a continuous basis, reviewing technical literature. App. at 138-139. However, Noettl was unable to identify any particular literature that he relied upon to form any of the opinions contained in his preliminary report. Id. Noettl testified that he did view films of crash tests in forming his opinions, Id. and he insisted that the alternative designs he suggested could be found inany machine design book. Id. at 48-49. Noettl did list a number of accepted authorities and textbooks in a document Oddi's counsel refers to as an offer of proof. Id. at 201. 65 Ford and Grumman point to specific portions of Noettl's depositions which they claim plainly demonstrate that Noettl's proffered expert testimony does not meet Daubert standards. Noettl opined that the front bumper was defective because it bent back when it struck the guardrail. He explained this was a defect becauseit was designed with a large lever arm on the vehicle, out from the frame rail. It had holes in it for towing, which, in my opinion, would greatly weaken the structure, especially with that large lever arm on it which would allow it to be bent back. App. at 45. Noettl claimed that the bumper should have been designed with either bracketry that would go from the frame rail out to the center part of that part of the bumper, or what [he referred to] as a backing wedge. Id. at 47. According to Noettl, the backing wedge would be like a V[ ]. Id. 66 However, when Noettl was asked to elaborate upon his belief that the bumper was defectively designed because it bent backward upon striking the guardrail the following exchange occurred: 67 Q: Now, have you determined what force was inflicted on the guardrail at the time of initial impact with the truck? 68 A: No, I haven't. No. 69 Q: Have you determined what force the truck inflicted on the bridge abutment and the rail on top of the bridge abutment when it made contact with that? 70 A: No, the reason for answering both those questions, you would have a range of variables, also, but guardrails are designed to absorb energy and deflect vehicles. You would have to make an awful lot of assumptions. 71 Q: Have you determined or measured the strength or rigidity of the guardrail? 72 A: No. 73 Q: You haven't ascertained how much force it could hold, is that correct? 74 A: That's correct. App. at 43-44. 75 Later in the deposition, Noettl testified as follows: 76 Q: Do you know how much force it took to bend that bumper to the point where it's bent? 77 A: No, I don't. 78 Q: Do you know how much force that bumper was capable of sustaining without bending? Have you determined that? 79 A: I haven't determined that, right. Id. at 46-47. 80 When Noettl was questioned about his proposed designs for the bumper, and design changes that would have been necessary to remedy the suggested defect, he offered several possibilities, but he conceded that he had not attempted to test or substantiate the modifications he was suggesting. 81 Q: What type of metal should the wedge be constructed from? 82 A: It could be the same as the bumper, if you wanted to, but you just turn it on end. You could have many, many choices on that. 83 Q: What if you used a brace? What type of metal should that brace be constructed from? 84 A: Again, you could use the same as the bumper. Again you would have a lot of choices on that. The bracketry would probably not be as strong as the wedge. Probably not. Test it and maybe you would achieve a strength that would far exceed anything you could expect. 85 Q: What would be the tensile strength or the gauge of the metal have to be on both of those options? 86 A: The way you go through is look up in books and you say, Here. We got some metal here and let's try this. Certain gauge, certain strength, something that is readily available. It's not a big thing, is what I'm trying to say. You certainly would not cut holes in it right at one of the most critical points of where you major bending force is going to occur, which is at your railing. 87 Q: So this would be something relatively simple to look up in a book, and you could determine from the computations in some engineering book what you should be using. What would the name of the book be? 88 A: Any machine design book. 89 Q: Is that a particular book or is that a type of a book, machine design book? 90 A: That's a type of book. 91 Q: Could you give me an authority? 92 A: There are machine design books that give you all types of metal gauges. If you go through the design process for any of these things on a bumper, frame rails, exactly what they do -- they don't sit down. They don't do finite element analysis. They look up in books what metal thickness, what's our yield strength, what's our tensile properties of this metal, bang, bang, bang. We're going to use this. 93 Q: Have you done that? 94 A: No. I haven't done that, no. 95 Q: So you don't know what the thickness would have to be, what the metal gauge, what the tensile strength -- 96 A: Right. 97 Q: -- what type of material you would need to use; is that correct? 98 A: I told you I would use -- probably start with the same material that you have in the bumper. Take a piece of metal, turn it on its edge, put it in back of it, weld it on there for a test, see what strength you do gain out of this as far as impact, as far as bending moments and as far as shearing. You sure hope it won't shear off. You would do that. You would say,I want it a little bit stronger. The easiest way, by far, is to thicken the metal. That's all you have to do. Get a lower gauge metal and put that on there and try it again. 99 Q: How thick would the metal have to have been to have not deformed in this impact? 100 A: I would say, in my opinion, half inch to an inch and a half range would be more than adequate to withstand the force on edge. That's the thickness, not the width. 101 Q: What would the width be? 102 A: I don't know. Three inches or so, four inches. 103
104 Kazarian, the biomechanical engineering consultant, was retained to explain how Oddi received his injuries. Kazarian authored a preliminary report, dated June 18, 1997, in which he opined: On impact, the end of the bridge pierced and penetrated the driver's occupant compartment impaling, cutting and crushing Mr. Oddi's extremities. The report noted that Oddi was found outside the vehicle on the grassy slope next to the bridge. App. at 113. Though Oddi had been thrown from the truck, Kazarian concluded that Oddi had sustained his primary injuries at the time he was in the driver's seated position, and that his injuries occurred as a result of the bridge piercing, penetrating and crushing his extremities while he was in the driver's compartment. Id. 105 The following exchange occurred during Kazarian's deposition: 106 Q: Have you considered what would have happened to Mr. Oddi in the event that there was no compromise to the floor of the vehicle and he still had the same accident? Are you able to tell us what would have happened to him physically? 107 A: No, not as I sit here. 108 Q: It could have been worse, it could have been better? 109 A: I don't know. 110