State transportation officials are assessing if a type of guard rail that's been installed in Vermont over the last 10 years poses safety hazards to the public. They are taking this step because a number of states have determined that these products are unsafe and could cause serious injury to motorists.
In the past month, four states, Massachusetts, Missouri, Virginia and Nevada have banned the future use of guard rails that were manufactured by a company in Texas.
"We are assessing where we have these end treatments across the state and monitoring their performance." - Rich Tatro, chief engineer at Vermont Transportation Agency
The concern is that a change in the design of the terminus of the guard rail has caused these products to malfunction. Instead of cushioning the blow of a car, these products break apart and become "bayonets" that penetrate the body of the car.
The Federal Highway Administration maintains that these so called "end point" guard rails do meet crash test requirements but the four concerned states are demanding that the products be retested.
Rich Tetreault, the chief engineer at the Vermont Agency of Transportation, says his agency is reviewing this situation because some of these guard rails have been used in a number of Vermont highway projects.
"We’re looking at the numbers. We’re certainly looking at data coming in from across the country," said Tetreault. "We're assessing where we have these end treatments across the state and monitoring their performance and taking the news seriously but we need to be prudent on what we do for a course of action based on facts."
Tetreault says the product in question is a very important part of the design and function of the entire guard rail.
"It’s an energy absorbing feature," said Tetreault. "There’s some question of how the steel section may have changed by one supplier over time and now what we need to do is weigh the risk if there is any with having that change in the feature and Federal Highway is going to help us on that front as well."
Tetreault says there’s no evidence that these specific guard rails have caused any injuries or fatalities in Vermont but he’s well aware that several states have banned their future use.
"Some like Vermont are looking at it closely haven’t put a moratorium on it yet," said Tetreault. "But it's certainly something that we want to evaluate and see what risk there are out there for Vermonters traveling the highways."
Because the design of these specific guard rails was changed in 2005, the Vermont Transportation Agency will review all of the projects where these products have been installed over the past nine years.
Tetreault says the Federal Highway Administration has pledged to work with individual states to assess these products.
Correction 3:25 p.m. Oct. 23, 2014. Story was updated to correct spelling of Rich Tetreault.
