A safety research group with ties to trial lawyers is asking the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to initiate a recall query on the August 2000 recall of 6.5 million Firestone ATX and Wilderness radial tires.
         BFS and Ford announced the recall after NHTSA collected accident reports that ATX and Wilderness tires that were original equipment on Ford Explorers and other Ford SUVs had caused 271 highway deaths and thousands of injuries. The tires suffered tread separations, resulting in rollover accidents, the agency said.
         At that time, Ford and BFS estimated that some 6.5 million of the recalled tires were still on the road, out of 14.4 million made. One statistical analysis showed that the fatality rate from accidents involving tire failures on Ford Explorers dropped significantly after the recall, but rose to pre-recall levels in 2003 and continued to rise in 2004.
          In a news release regarding the NHTSA letter, he cited the case of Michael Enriquez, a Florida man who bought a 1993 Ford Explorer in November 2004. Six months later, a Firestone tire on the vehicle suffered a tread separation and caused a rollover, leaving Enriquez a quadriplegic.