According to a government document, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has launched a new investigation into about 30 million vehicles produced by more than 20 automakers from 2001 to 2019. These vehicles were installed by Japan’s Takata Corporation. The airbags produced may have defects.
NHTSA launched an engineering analysis of these cars last Friday. The relevant automakers were reminded to pay attention to the investigation, but the investigation has not been made public, and it is not expected to be officially announced until Monday.
The car companies involved in this investigation include Honda, Ford, Toyota, GM, Nissan, Subaru, Tesla, Ferrari, Mazda, Daimler, BMW, Chrysler (now part of Stellattis), Porsche, Jaguar Land Rover, etc.
NHTSA said in the document that these 30 million vehicles include those with airbag inflators installed during production, as well as some cars that were replaced with inflators during previous recalls and repairs.
In the past 10 years, the United States has recalled more than 67 million Takata airbag inflators, and more than 100 million have been recalled globally. This is the largest in the history of automobile safety recalls, because in rare cases, metal fragments from the inflator may be ruptured. Injured passengers or even died.
So far, this problem has caused at least 28 deaths worldwide, including 19 in the United States, and more than 400 injured.
The 30 million vehicles involved in the new investigation are equipped with inflators with desiccant. NHTSA said that there are no reports of rupture in vehicles using airbag inflators with a desiccant added. The agency said: “Although the safety risk has not yet been determined, further research is still needed to evaluate the long-term safety of the desiccant inflator.”
NHTSA has stated that the reason for the explosion of the Takata airbag inflator is that these airbags use ammonium nitrate as a propellant, which is prone to decomposition when exposed to high temperature and high humidity for a long time.
After that, Takata began to produce a new type of inflator with a desiccant. It is said that this desiccant can keep the ammonium nitrate solution dry and prevent the accident from happening again.
But now it seems that this method cannot ensure safety. NHTSA stated that the investigation “will require extensive information about Takata’s production process, as well as an investigation of on-site inflators.”
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