Welcome! & Africa

Thank you for visiting "Volvo on Fire!"  Please enjoy this blog and let us know what your thoughts are on the whole experience:  burnedvolvo@westonfilm.com.  We are currently in Africa shooting a documentary about the event "Run Across Ethiopia," and we'd love your support.  You can check out our Kickstarter page for more information:  http://kck.st/eu9TUc
Thank you!
~James & Jamaica

Our burned up Volvo Wagon - a picture story

Like many people do,

we loved our "safe" Volvo for travel, leisure, and business:

 As smoke poured out from the front seat, we pulled over

and seconds after we jumped out, the car went up in flames:

 The starter motor wiring tripped and it drove itself backward

uphill into the ditch like an electric car & moving ball of fire:

We had just topped off the fuel tank that afternoon,

it magnified the fire with huge streaks of flames:

  The firemen arrive to a totaled loss of the car:

 The trail where the car drove itself backward uphill while burning:

 Jamaica and I were stunned; a huge part of our life went up in flames:

 The Volvo turned into a solid hunk of metal and

fused plastics; the toxic odor was unbearable:

 What if we had children (s)trapped into this family car?
Could've we got them out in time?

Before I started taking pictures, I didn't

realize my phone was on "video mode:"

Our Volvo fire experience

We are James and Jamaica Weston and we live in Traverse City, Michigan. We have always been huge fans of Volvo cars and used our 1996 850 Wagon for many pleasure and work trips. Owning a small film production company requires us to haul video equipment around with us; our Volvo wagon was the perfect vehicle to fit our needs. I grew up in a family that had a half dozen Volvo family cars over the span of my upbringing. I always prided our station wagons as being some of the safest and reliable cars on the road.

On the evening of September 21^st , 2010, my wife and I were driving to a meeting when brown smoke suddenly poured out from between my legs under the driver's seat. Neither of us smoke, we didn't have anything that would start a fire, and the only quick conclusion we could come to was that the heat-seat had shorted out even though it wasn't even turned on. Within seconds of smelling and seeing the smoke, we had pulled onto the shoulder of the road, jumped out of the car, and moments later flames engulfed the front seats and quickly spread throughout the whole interior. We had just unfortunately topped off the gas tank that afternoon and as we sprinted far away from the car, the gas started exploding and sending up huge flames. The fire somehow tripped the starter wiring and apparently the starter motor powered the burning car and drove it like an electric car 50 yards backward uphill as the fire intensified; (I had put the stick in reverse to hold the car in place when I shut it off, at first I thought I had left it running when I saw it begin moving, but I checked and had the car key in my pocket).

Our car finally backed itself down a ditch as the firemen arrived and extinguished the burning skeleton. The whole evening experience was so surreal, one minute we are peacefully driving, 5 minutes later the car is unmanned driving itself backwards up a hill without the engine running while 12 foot flames streaked into the sky. We thought to ourselves: what if we had had our two infant nieces strapped into the back seat that day? The lose would have been imaginable and even more scary. So quickly the fire engine and crew had come and gone, the wrecker had taken the charred skeleton away, the police were gone, and we are standing on a grassy embankment all alone waiting for our friends to whisk us home.

Our Volvo wagon was our only car and at least a $2,500 loss (we only had PLPD basic insurance which didn't cover the loss). We have been forced to survive without a car over the past three months which has meant turning down many film production business opportunities due to not having an adequate way of transporting equipment. Not having a car and not being able to afford a new car has meant a loss of several thousand dollars in wages from missed job opportunities that required travel outside of the city where we live. Jamaica and I have always regarded Volvo not only as a leader in car safety, but as a company that watched out for its customers. Now that reputation has been disrupted in our minds as well as the minds of hundreds of our friends and acquaintances.

Our experience with the Volvo Product Investigation Coordinator Erica Kirsch was a positive one up till our last communication. She was very helpful in getting the car inspected by an engineer but said Volvo couldn't do anything for us because the car was too burned up to tell what the fire had been exactly caused by. She claimed that we had a lot of flammable “things” in the car almost implying that it was our fault the car had burned up. Sitting on the back seat we did have a stack of papers for our meeting that night and a change of clothes, but nothing that would ignite a fire. We always kept our car maintained and in good working condition and after significant research, we found out that the fire might have had something to do with the 2002 recall on the heat-seats for our exact model and year of car. Jamaica and I would love nothing more than to put this horrific happening in our past and move on but we so often reflect on what it used to be like having a car as we are forced to bicycle around town over winter icy roads blasted by well-below freezing wind-chills and snow squalls. We can just barley pay our bills each month through our film work; we will not be able to afford a new or used car for some time unless Volvo takes responsibility & steps up and helps out their customers.

Recall notice & Volvos on fire

VOLVO: POTENTIAL SAFETY PROBLEMS
2/26/03

Recall campaign # 112

'96 VOLVO 850 Wagon Recall - SEATS:FRONT ASSEMBLY:SEAT HEATER/COOLER

Recall Date:	NOV 19, 2002
Component:	SEATS:FRONT ASSEMBLY:SEAT HEATER/COOLER
Model Affected:	850
Potential Units Affected:	65000

Description of Recall:
ON SOME SEDANS AND STATION WAGONS EQUIPPED WITH SEAT HEATERS, IT IS POSSIBLE THAT EXCESSIVE COMPRESSION OF THE SEAT CUSHION COULD CAUSE DAMAGE TO THE ELECTRICAL WIRING OF THE SEAT HEATER.

This recall is now underway involving thousands of Volvo's because of a dangerous defect. It comes on the heels of an Action News investigation. We first exposed a potential safety problem in some Volvo vehicles earlier this month. One week later, the automaker started sending recall notices to 65,000 consumers. But does that recall go far enough?

Who can forget Sue Ferrick? 

Sue Ferrick/MALVERN, PA.:

I could have lost my family. There's no words. I just think it's an absolute disgrace.
The Ferricks barely made it out of their car alive last December, after the seat heater in their 1997 Volvo 850 short circuited and caught fire.

Sue Ferrick/MALVERN, PA.:

We had like less than a minute, I think to get out of that car.
After Action News called Volvo - the automaker agreed to give her another car. This is the recall notice thousands of Volvo consumers have now received. It covers 1996 and 97 850 sedans and wagons. The question is - is this enough?

Volvo says it's not expanding the recall because the incidents of fire are less frequent in other models and years, and in part, because they don't think there's a great risk for personal injury because they've found there's enough time to leave the car before the seat catches fire. But try telling that to John Simkiss. 

John Simkiss/WAYNE, PA.:

This is where my girls were sitting just half hour before the fire started.
These are pictures from his 1994 Volvo 850, which isn't covered by the recall.

John Simkiss/WAYNE, PA.:

The windows shattered and it was shooting flames 15 feet into the car with a huge column of smoke that attracted my neighbors.
We were very fortunate that no one was hurt.
Simkiss says an independent fire inspector tells him the seat heaters are the probable cause. But Volvo says because the car was so badly burned, it cannot conclusively determine a product defect is at fault. And the seat heaters involved in the recall are different from the seat heaters in any other vehicle manufactured before or after 1996 and 1997. 

Volvo has a serious problem and they are not addressing it and it makes me so angry.

All of a sudden, I just jumped out of my seat.
Dino Malitas drives a 1999 Volvo S-70 which isn't covered by the recall either.

Dino Malitas/ABINGTON, PA.:

I would tell them to recall this year as well as other years. This is a dangerous situation.
Volvo replaced the seat in his car free of charge after the heater coils on the driver's side got so hot - the seat started smoking!

Dino Malitas/ABINGTON, PA.:

It was like touching a hot stove.
The next person might not be as lucky as I was.
Volvo also hasn't issued the current recall to customers in other countries even though the equipment on those vehicles are the same as the ones here. Volvo says that's because it's seen a higher frequency of incidents in North America, they will keep a close eye on the situation in other markets.

By the way, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is the federal agency that oversees vehicle recalls in the US. Spokespeople will only tell us they do not comment on ongoing or pending investigations.