EP 84: The Ford Pinto's Explosive History

This week on Hashtag History, we are discussing the Ford Pinto’s Explosive History. The 1971 Ford Pinto was rushed into production for a myriad of reasons that we will be getting into in this episode. Because of this rushed turnaround time, Ford had to cut a lot of corners. And these corners included selling a car with a fuel tank that Ford KNEW carried a high risk of setting on fire during rear-end collisions. When Ford conducted a cost-benefit analysis, they found that it would cost them more to fix the car than it would to just pay off all the legal fees that came along with all of the wrongful death suits they received. Ford would continue to manufacture this same, dangerous model for years, leading to the deaths of approximately twenty-seven people.

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