On Aug. 1, 2014, plaintiffs’ decedent Cornelia Wilson, 51, a truck driver, was operating a 2009 Freightliner Columbia tractor-trailer, which was equipped with two 100-gallon, side-mounted, diesel fuel tanks. While she was driving on Interstate 710, just south of Imperial, her truck, for reasons unknown, veered off the road and collided with a tree. Wilson survived the initial impact, but the exposed, side-mounted fuel tank on the driver’s side was pierced by the truck’s axle during the accident, causing diesel fuel to spray out of the tank and erupt into flames. An eyewitness saw the cab of the truck intact, but within a few seconds, the eyewitness saw a 20-plus foot fireball engulf the cab. Wilson was subsequently burned to death. Wilson’s adult children — Shanisha Courtney, Raymond Courtney Jr. and Martel Courtney — sued the truck’s designer, Daimler Trucks North America, LLC, and a Mexican entity, Daimler Vehiculos Comerciales Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V. The Courtney family alleged that the defendants were negligent in the defective design of the truck, causing Wilson’s wrongful death. Daimler Vehiculos Comerciales Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V. was ultimately dismissed by the court for lack of personal jurisdiction. Plaintiffs’ counsel contended that Wilson would have survived, but for the post-collision diesel fire. As a result, counsel argued that the subject truck and its fuel system were defectively designed, in that the exposed side-mounted fuel tanks were extremely vulnerable and easily susceptible to piercing by other components of the truck. As an alternative, plaintiffs’ counsel proposed allegedly safer designs of the truck and its fuel system, namely moving the fuel tank behind the cab, where it would be much less exposed and vulnerable. Defense counsel contended that millions of trucks with the subject design had been sold with no issues and that no other manufacturer has a Class 8 truck with the tank behind the cab. Counsel also contended that the subject truck’s side-mounted fuel tank system was the safest possible design and that plaintiffs’ counsel’s proposed safer alternative designs could not/would not work for a variety of reasons. In addition, defense counsel argued that Wilson was negligent for veering off the highway and colliding with the tree., Wilson sustained no fractures or blunt force trauma in the collision with the tree. However, she sustained fatal burn when the fuel tank erupted into flames. An autopsy detected no drugs, alcohol, or serious medical conditions. As a result, plaintiffs’ counsel argued that Wilson burned to death in an otherwise survivable crash due to the post-collision, fuel-fed fire. Wilson’s adult sons, Martel Courtney (then 31 years old) and Raymond Courtney Jr. (then 33 years old), and adult daughter, Shanisha Courtney (then 38 years old), sought recovery of general damages for their loss of love, companionship, comfort, care, assistance, protection, affection, society and moral support in regard to the wrongful death of their mother.