Iranian Five Passenger Zippos

Fresh news out of Tehran:

HUNDREDS of Iranian-made cars have suddenly caught fire on Iran's roads over the past months, with police pointing to the Peugeot 405 as the main culprit.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

The Iranians are manufacturing splodeydopin' suicidal Fwench cars!!! Instead of fifteen pounds of Semtex and nails, just take a test drive in a brand new Iranian car, "le Zippo."

Since the beginning of the Iranian year in March, there have been 125 incidents of cars catching fire without warning and then killing or injuring the occupants, traffic police chief Mohammad Rooyanian said.

"Around 300 people have been killed or wounded and 40 per cent of the fatalities were attributed to the Peugeot 405," he told the Kayhan newspaper.

The Peugeot 405, is a very popular model in Iran. The most popular car is the Paykan modelled after the British Hillman. Approximately 40% of all cars registered in Iran are Paykans. Other models include the Souren and the Samand which is entirely of Iranian design and manufacture.

The Peugeot 405 and other well-known models from the French carmaker have been manufactured under licence since 1990 by Iran Khodro, Iran's largest car manufacturer." Fire service figures from the first six months of the year have said that 700 cars caught fire in Tehran, out of which 70 per cent of them were manufactured by Iran Khodro," Mr Rooyanian said.

These cars are sold with a full tank of gas, three quarts of "Allah's Revenge" barbeque sauce and extra flints.

Iran Khodro's director of marketing Mehdi Ghasem said the problem was an "occasional technical fault in the fuel system" in cars more than two years old and emphasised that vehicles made in this Iranian year had no such fault.

It was just such an"occasional technical fault" in the fuel tank of the Ford Pinto that resulted in hundreds of deaths in the 1970's. One report indicated that:

the Ford Motor Company makes 24 per cent of the cars on the American road, yet these cars account for 42 per cent of the collision-ruptured fuel tanks.

Another staggering fact that was discovered was that a large and growing number of corpses taken from burned cars involved in rear-end crashes contained no cuts, bruises or broken bones.

They clearly would have survived the accident unharmed if the cars had not caught fire.

The Ford fiasco was a result of a cold hearted economic decision not to address the fault, which was discovered in test crashs conducted before the Pinto went into production. The tests indicated that the cars burst in flames when involved in a rear impact collision. The reason? The trunk of the Pinto would crush into the passenger compartment, splitting open the gas tank in the process.

As Lee Iacocco infamously stated, "Safety doesn't sell." The cost to fix the Pinto gas tank problem: just $5.08 per car to install a rubber bladder inside the tank. The Pinto went into production without it.

In comparison, the Iranian models apparently turn into gas fired grills for no reason. Maybe the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, believes that there was no Holocaust because all those Jews were killed in automobile accidents?

The traffic police chief, Mr Rooyanian, continues,

"We are not to going compromise on this issue. We are emphasising the need to improve the safety of the vehicles, so that our citizens will not be worried any more."

The citizens still uncharred that is. All this goof says is that they are emphasizing the need for improvements in safety. Actual changes to the vehicles to protect the Irani consumer? Programs to recall dangerous vehicle models? Guess again. In the same breathless fashion he finishes:

"Neither us nor the police have received any report on such a fault in this year's cars. Therefore, the registration process will automatically go on," he said, dismissing warnings of a ban on the car.

Ban them? No way! Use them as street lights!

Let me introduce the new fuel-efficient, four-cylinder, Iranian family car ... le Bic!


UPDATE:
Maybe the Iranian cars are suffering from sympathy flames. The muzzies are at it again in France. About four hundred cars were torched during New Year "celebrations."