MORNING-08
models and its forcing automakers to change the way you put your car in
gear.>
replacements especially in luxury brands.>
ANTHONY MASON: U.S. government is investigating the technology used in some jeep models and it`s forcing automakers to change the way you put your car in gear. There are swapping out traditional gear shifters with digital replacements especially in luxury brands. Kris Van Cleave got an up close look at the technology. He`s in Washington. Kris, good morning.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE (CBS News Transportation Correspondent): Good morning. Part of what`s driving the shift to electronic transmissions is they take up less space, making more room for things like new technology and even bigger cup holders. But here in this vehicle, you have a shifter that now feels a lot like a boat throttle and that`s leading to the confusion because you really have to make sure you put the vehicle into park.
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KRIS VAN CLEAVE: Gary Titus leased a 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee, a vehicle built with a new kind of electronic transmission that changed the feel of shifting gears, maybe too much.
GARY TITUS: If I don`t hit it just right and get it into drive, I could get into an accident because of that.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: The new shifter is a monostable electronic gearshift or e- shift. It lacks the typical grooves and sensation of moving the car into park, drive, or reverse. That lack of familiarity nearly resulted in a serious injury.
GARY TITUS: I get out of the jeep. I thought it was in park and it was in reverse still. And as I walked back towards the garage, I noticed the car was moving a little bit and I didn`t want to ruin the car after having it just for a few months so I got between the car and the garage and I was able to yell for my son and stop the car at the same time.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: Titus isn`t the only one confused by the technology. Hundreds have filed complaints saying their vehicle rolled away after thinking it was in park. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is now investigating more than eight hundred and fifty thousand vehicles. Most are 2014 and 2015 Grand Cherokees equipped with e-shift. Government investigators found, it "...is not intuitive and provides poor tactile and visual feedback to the driver, increasing the potential for unintended gear selection." That investigation claims reports of one hundred twenty-one accidents resulting in several people being hospitalized.
SEAN KANE (Safety Research & Strategies, Inc., President): These new technologies that are coming into cars are creating all kinds of new problems.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: Sean Kane, president of Safety Research and Strategies, wants stricter safety standards for new technology added to vehicles.
SEAN KANE: You get into a car today, if you haven`t been in it and it`s hard to understand even how to start it, how to shift it. We`re seeing all types of different control systems and that`s creating problems for consumers, new ways that people are going to get killed and injured as a result of poor design.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: We drove a 2014 Grand Cherokee at the Consumer Reports test track in Connecticut.
Here, I mean I guess it`s because there is also not like I pushed all the way forward that doesn`t necessarily mean I end up in park.
JONATHON LINKOV: It is confusing and odd and then it doesn`t have any safety mechanism.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: Jonathon Linkov is their deputy auto editor.
JONATHON LINKOV: What we would like to see is that there is a fail-safe so at the end of the day you don`t have a problem where the car is going to launch forward, roll backwards, move in some way that the consumer is not expecting it.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: And is Fiat Chrysler shifter lacks any sort of fail-safe?
JONATHON LINKOV: Well, it lacks the fail-safe and that if you leave it in drive or you leave it in neutral and you open the door or you press the button to turn off the vehicle, it still stays in that mode. It doesn`t go directly to park.
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: BMW and Mercedes added that kind of fail-safe feature after introducing similar electronic transmission technology.
So it shifted from drive to neutral because I turned off the car.
JONATHON LINKOV: Yeah. But if you open the door, it goes to park. So that`s the safety feature.
(End VT)
KRIS VAN CLEAVE: Jeep drivers do get a warning on the dashboard. Fiat Chrysler says it`s cooperating fully with the ongoing NHTSA investigation. As of the 2016 model year it`s changed the transmission in new vehicles but has not recalled any of the existing models. The automaker says those changes were due to customer satisfaction, not safety reasons. Norah.
NORAH O`DONNELL: All right, Kris. Thank you. Really important information.
Ahead, the Easter Bunny`s brawl inside a busy mall. But, first, it`s seven forty-seven, time to check your local weather.
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NORAH O`DONNELL: Well, the Easter Bunny may have gotten up on the wrong foot with shoppers at a New Jersey mall. Cell phone video posted to Twitter shows a man partially dressed in a bunny costume throwing punches at a customer. The two men were separated but the bunny threw off his gloves and again approached the customer. It`s not clear what sparked this scuffle.
ANTHONY MASON: Maybe somebody--
GAYLE KING: They might have asked him do you have any more purple peeps and he just got really upset about that.
ANTHONY MASON: Somebody got a rotten egg. All right.
GAYLE KING: Yes.
ANTHONY MASON: Airbnb leads the way for American businesses in Cuba. Ahead, first on CBS THIS MORNING, we talk to the company`s co-founder in Havana.
You`re watching CBS THIS MORNING.
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