The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has dismissed calls for a much wider ruling on Takata’s airbag inflators.
Some legislators have asked the NHTSA to demand a broader recall of every Takata inflator that uses ammonium-nitrate propellant. Safety advocates have claimed Takata covered up internal tests showing which inflators are prone to failure, while poor record keeping has further contributed to confusion.
Exemplifying the concerns, shrapnel injuries were blamed for a Ford Ranger driver’s death in a recent accident. The passenger-side airbag had already been recalled, however the driver-side inflator was not deemed defective until after it had been associated with a fatality.
“A blanket recall of all inflaters would be easier to explain, but it would not serve safety and could run the risk of exceeding NHTSA’s statutory authority,” agency head Mark Rosekind wrote in a letter to a concerned senator, as quoted by The New York Times.
Regulators have pushed for the highest-risk vehicles to be repaired first, including older models and those that have been operated in regions of high humidity. Both age and moisture have been cited as primary factors in propellant degradation and consequent explosions.
Despite Rosekind’s dismissive comments of a total recall in the near term, a consent order with Takata requires the company to prove that its ammonium-nitrate inflators are safe. The remaining population, including tens of millions of inflators, could be deemed defective if the company cannot verify their safety by 2018.
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