A type of roadside guardrail that has sparked controversy about its safety has passed a set of crash tests, and states can continue to seek federal reimbursements for the cost of purchasing it, the Federal Highway Administration says.
The test results, which FHWA officials announced on March 13, aren’t the last word, however, on the ET-Plus guardrail end caps, made by Dallas-based Trinity Industries Inc. FHWA officials say that they will continue to review additional information about the product, including data on how they have performed in the field.
On Capitol Hill, Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) sharply criticized FHWA for what he terms its “inadequate oversight” of the guardrails and contended it let Trinity “conduct sham tests rife with flaws.”
Blumenthal and five other Senate Democrats on March 3 also asked the Government Accountability Office to study FHWA’s role in ensuring safety of guardrails and other roadside hardware, the process for developing rules governing such equipment and the testing process for the devices.
The ET-Plus controversy heated up last October, when a federal jury in Texas returned a verdict valued at $525 million against Trinity, which, the senators said, was alleged to have altered the guardrail specifications without notifying FHWA.
Since then, 40 states plus the District of Columbia suspended use of the ET-Plus as of Nov. 18, a FHWA spokesman said. He added that the agency has received no further updates from states since November.
Virginia officials on Dec. 11 filed a lawsuit against Trinity, alleging that the company made changes in the guardrail end cap and didn't disclose the changes to FHWA or the state.