Coroner calls for redesign of Jaguar I-PACE after death of 7-year old boy
The coroner of an inquest into the death of a seven-year-old boy has warned Jaguar Land Rover that “action should be taken to avoid future deaths,” after the boy was crushed between two parked cars, stating the car manufacturer had not fitted its I-PACE all-electric SUV model with any intermediaries to prevent mistakes like this from occurring.
Jaguar’s I-PACE is operated by three buttons, labelled “D” for drive, “N” for neutral and “R” for reverse. These buttons are located in a row on the console, where a traditional gear stick would be.
Alfie Tollett, seven, was crushed between two parked cars after the driver of the I-PACE “relied on feel” to distinguish between the drive and reverse buttons. After being put into drive – rather than reverse - the car drove forward for up to 10 seconds, shunting a parked car into Tollett.
Tollett was rushed to hospital, where he was pronounced dead an hour after the incident. Blunt-force traumatic chest injuries were given as the official cause of death.
The driver of the I-PACE has not been prosecuted due to having died before the incident could have been tried. The man was arrested on suspicion of causing death by careless driving prior to his death.
The inquiry found the driver used only ‘feel’ to locate the buttons, and did not double-check to ensure he had selected the correct option.
While there was no malfunction of the Jaguar I-PACE, coroner Deborah Archer is criticising the car company for the design of the buttons. Archer believes the lack of intermediary steps within the vehicle is at fault and that if there were more steps involved in the process this would not have happened.
The coroner found in her inquest the incident should be deemed as an accident, but stated a series of failures led to the boys' death: incorrectly putting the car into drive instead of reverse, failing to check what setting had been selected, failure to hear the reversing warning sound, failure to realise the car was not reversing, failure to apply the brakes at any point and continuing to apply the accelerator for eight to 10 seconds.
The coroner stated in her verdict these errors occurred due to no intermediary steps being installed in the I-PACE model. She believes only needing a simple touch of a button is not a sufficient enough method of changing driving operation and more is needed to ensure a fail-safe to prevent drivers from incorrectly selecting the wrong option.
Police officers reportedly told the coroner that had a lever been required to operate the button this would have alerted the driver to the fact he selected the wrong button, which she included in her report.
The coroner's report reads: “In my opinion action should be taken to prevent future deaths and I believe you have the power to take such action.”
Data gathering platform Statista found that in 2020 38% of all road accidents were caused by drivers not looking properly, this is the leading cause of accidents in the UK. Human error is overall the biggest contributor to UK road traffic accidents.
Just last week, Jaguar Land Rover executive director of product engineering, Thomas Mueller, stated it is "vital that drivers learn about the systems fitted to their cars and how to operate and maintain them so that they work most effectively," in response to a survey the company conducted on understanding around Advanced Driving Assistance Systems (ADAS). In the press release, the company said its next-generation electric vehicles will be built on the company’s NVIDIA DRIVE software platform, which promises to deliver “a wide spectrum of active safety, automated driving and parking systems."
Jaguar Land Rover has been given 56 days from the initial report to respond to the coroner's report, culminating on the 22nd of October. This must contain detailed outlines of what steps will be taken to rectify mistakes or an explanation as to why no action is required.
Engineer Live has reached out to Jaguar Land Rover for comment.