NYPD officer Gary Schneider, 42, was leading a training session in which he was showing other officers how to use the personal transporter, when one the wheels of his scooter locked and threw Schneider off.
New York City Injury Lawyers bring – New York Injury News – New York City, New York (New York Injury News – News Report) – The zippy little Segway scooter has become extremely popular in airports, malls and parking garages all across America. The rider simply uses his or her body weight to shift directions.
Sold at over$5,000 each, the scooters are powered by creative technology that uses a network of sensors and control systems. They are quick, easy to balance on, and most helpful in situations where police cars would not fit and walking is too slow.
Ironically, NYPD officer Gary Schneider, 42, was leading a training session in which he was showing other officers how to use the personal transporter, when one the wheels of his scooter locked and threw Schneider off. He suffered a fractured leg, requiring five hours of surgery. Schneider vouches that the scooters are defective and unreasonably dangerous, and that his career as a police officer has been ended by the crash.
Since the Segways made their first appearance in 2003, there have been many minor accidents with lawsuits to follow. Not surprisingly, there have also been two recalls of the scooter due to defects. In one recall alone there were 6,000 Segways taken off the market after reports came in that the vehicles were stopping suddenly, causing their passengers to lose their balance. Then, in 2006, about 23,500 of the scooters were recalled due to a software defect which was found to sometimes cause the vehicles to go backwards unexpectedly. These machines have obviously not been perfected and in order for more people to use them with fewer accidents, the software must be perfected. Thankfully, the reported cases have had minor repercussions, yet we should not delay to have them fixed, especially when the officials who are protecting our highly populated areas use them.
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