Most class RVers will have a toad. This wht you must have a tirepressure monitor. I have had mant different brands the one I like is EEZ.
https://eezrvproducts.com/
For anyone else who is curious about the subject:
I have seen various mentions of a fire caused by a towed vehicle
several years ago in Idaho, and a subsequent state suit against the
driver. The details often vary, and lately include the couple being
driven into bankruptcy, etc. Being the curious type, I went looking
for details. Surprisingly, there is little about the topic on web
pages according to a variety of searches.
What I did find was a thread from 1997 in alt.folklore.urban where
someone asked if it was a fable. At the end ot that thread, a Becca
Ward (talo...@deathstar.org) posted this as the result of a nexis
search:
-------------------------------------
Michael E. Ruane, "Feet Held to the Fire; Idaho Bills Tourists $1.3M
for
Negligence," _The Bergen Record,_ May 6, 1993 (Knight-Ridder News
Service):
His first sign of trouble came when Frederick C. Howard
looked in the side mirror and saw a ball of fire shoot from
behind his motor home where he was towing the Honda Civic.
By the time he pulled his big tan rig over, the fire had
spread from the car's blown right rear tire and was engulfing
the car. Howard, 67, just had time to unhook the motor home
and move it clear.
He and his wife, Jeanne, who had turned 70 the day before,
then stood in the 90-degree heat of the Idaho summer and
watched as their gray Honda was incinerated.
That was enough to ruin any vacation. But little did the
Scranton, Pa., residents know that their barbecued car was
only the beginning. In the distance, around a bend in the
road, a pall of smoke was rising from the drought-parched
underbrush. Debris from the burning Honda apparently had
ignited a fire that soon would scorch 6,258 acres, and
require hundreds of firefighters, six aircraft, several bulldozers, and four days to control.
The worst was yet to come. A few months after the retired
couple returned to their home in a rural township east of
here last July, they received a letter, signed "cordially"
by a forestry official, from the state of Idaho. Payment
was demanded for fighting the fire. The bill?
In the end it would come to: $1,313,105.10.
"My God," Jeanne Howard thought when she read that first
letter. Her husband, a World War II Marine Corps aviator,
thought he was being made out a criminal. She has a bad
back and high blood pressure. He has emphysema and has been
treated for prostate cancer.
With insurance that covered about one-quarter of the fee,
they hoped for some compromise and wondered what to do.
Idaho, however, has been adamant. It wants the money and
has filed suit to collect. . . . [T]his is believed to be
the largest bill Idaho has ever tried to collect, officials
said.
Whatever the cost, if those responsible don't pay, "the
taxpayers of the state... will pay," said Idaho Deputy
Attorney General Stephanie A. Balzarini. Depositions are
scheduled for this month. A trial has been set for this
fall in Boise, the state capital.
"They're, like, criminalizing me, like I went out there
and took a match and burnt their damn forest down,"
Frederick Howard said. . . . "I didn't feel that I
willfully did it," he said. "And I didn't feel that I was
negligent because I had a flat tire.... If I'd have seen
that tire was flat, I'd have stopped. That's common sense.
Unless I'm an idiot, I would stop."
The sympathetic press coverage of the Howards apparently stirred up
some public outrage about the efforts of the Idaho Department of Lands
to recover payment -- including in the Idaho-area press. _See,_e.g.,_ Bill Hall, "Charging a Fortune for an Idaho Act of God,"
_Lewiston Morning Tribune,_ May 31, 1993 (Editorial) at 8A ("There is
a difference between starting a fire through your own recklessness
such as fireworks or an untended campfire and what happened to [the]
Howard[s] . . . [T]his falls into some kind of act-of-God category,
more like a bolt of lightning than recklessness [and t]he general
taxpayers normally eat such costs"). Idaho's efforts to seek reimbursement for costs incurred in
fighting a forest fire started by a Lake Ariel, Pa., couple
has attracted considerable attention from eastern news
organizations over the past few weeks. Unfortunately, the
news has been based on a decidedly one-sided presentation of
the facts. . . .
The Howards continued to drive despite the desperate efforts
of other drivers who tried to get their attention by
repeatedly honking their horns, blinking their headlights
and swerving their vehicles.
The rear end of the Honda eventually burst into flames,
trailing a column of black smoke. By the time the Howards
finally stopped, nearly eight miles after the blow-out, the
metal wheel was ground flat to the brake drum, and the
Honda was consumed by flames.
The many small fires spread quickly in the 90-degree heat.
They joined into a single inferno, closing Highway 55 for
two days, and scorching over 6,200 acres of public and
private land. Hundreds of firefighters, six aircraft, and
scores of bulldozers and fire engines took four days to
control the fire. Before the suppression effort was over,
Idaho had spent over $1 million of general tax fund money
. . .The Howards and the Idaho Department of Lands reportedly settled the
matter for $300,000 (apparently, the limits of their insurance
policy), as stated in a report of another fire-by-negligence story
from 1996. "Foothills Fire: Blame Shooter," _The Idaho Statesman,_
August 30, 1996 (Editorial) at 16A:
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