This was one of the leading factors to the closing of the Decatur plant.

Many here - including the Firestone workers - do not even believe the Decatur plant was primarily at fault.

In 1977 Firestone recalled of 400,000 tires produced at the Decatur plant.

For factories other than the Decatur plant, the rate approached 100 claims per million tires for tires produced from 1993 to 1995.

In 1977 a recall of 400,000 tires produced at the problematic Decatur plant was initiated.

Both Firestone and Ford said yesterday that evidence pointed to tires made at the Decatur plant as the proper focus of further investigation.

The company is also looking at "process controls" at the Decatur plant.

The Decatur plant is a scapegoat, they say, and that has many worried about the future of the plant.

The Decatur plant also produces paraxylene and naphthalene dicarboxlate.

Ford officials said many of the defective tires were made in the Decatur plant when it was using replacement workers.