The yellow sac spider hits the road with the Mazda 6
Mazda 6 recall: Beware the yellow sac spider and the web it weaves
By Melissa Bell
The Washington Post Blog
In Friday's terrifying news story of the day, a tiny spider's web might crack apart your car engine and start a fire. But only if you have a Mazda 6. And no one has any idea why this is happening.
The news has forced Mazda to recall 65,000 cars in the United States, Canada and Mexico. The spider is the yellow sac spider. Mazda dealers reported 20 cases of webs being found in a vent connected to the fuel tank system. The webs could clog the ventilation system, applying pressure to the fuel tank, which could then crack and cause a fuel leakage. The Associated Press reports:
"Mazda spokesman Jeremy Barnes said dealers had identified 20 cases in which spider webs were found in the vents. The webs were linked to yellow sac spiders, Barnes said, but it was unclear why they were crawling into the Mazda 6 rather than other vehicles.Adding to the mystery, Barnes said the arachnoid attraction to the sporty cars -- which the company has marketed with its 'zoom-zoom' tagline -- had no specific connection to a particular region of North America."
Click here to read the entire article at The Washington Post's Blog
About the Yellow Sac Spider
The Cheiracanthium, also known as the yellow sac spider is a genus of spiders in the Miturgidae family. Certain species are commonly known as the "yellow sac spider". They are usually pale to in colour, and have an abdomen that can range from yellow to beige.
The yellow sac spider's venom is necrotic (premature death of cells and living tissue and can cause a small lesion in humans. Because of the necrotic nature of the wound, MRSA (a bacterium responsible for several difficult-to-treat infections in humans) infection is a danger and victims are advised to seek medical treatment.
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