Lucas Bell 
Detroit’s Automakers began to shutter their production facilities back in March as the country started its fight with the coronavirus. The months-long shutdown appears to be coming to an end, with the majority of the country’s auto workers now gearing up to return to work on May 18. While plants like the one that constructs the C8 Corvette in Bowling Green, Kentucky were non-operational during that time, a report by The New York Times gives us a bit more information about those who stayed on the assembly line during the pandemic’s outbreak. As it turns out, the C8 Corvette chassis is actually an “essential product.”
The new report by NYT explains how General Motors was able to keep their facility in Bedford, Indiana online since March while others were forced to close. This plant is the one that is responsible for the production of the C8 Corvette chassis, a car that has already faced a great deal of setbacks related to building units. In order to avoid any further slowdowns in Kentucky next week, a limited number of workers in Bedford have been coming in to fill the line on a volunteer basis.
A skeleton crew of about 20 people per shift, over the course of three shifts a day, have helped GM to stockpile C8 Corvette chassis. Considering that the factory would usually have 250 people on the line during a normal shift, the progress likely hasn’t been tremendous.
The C8 Corvette is considered to be a massively important vehicle for GM, and that is not just because of its mid-engined design. The sports car was intended to make up a significant chunk of the company’s revenue in 2020, though setbacks with the UAW and now the coronavirus have already lowered the number of Corvettes available this year. With production facilities slated to reopen next week, the work done in Bedford over the last two months should help Corvette buyers get the cars they ordered sooner than we originally expected.
