The US government wants 52 million airbags recalled. The companies that put them in cars are pushing back

By Peter Valdes-Dapena and Greg Wallace, CNN

(CNN) — The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration held a public meeting Thursday to discuss the possible recall of 52 million airbags produced by ARC Automotive and Delphi Automotive Systems.

Inflators in these air bags, used in millions of vehicles from 11 different manufacturers, could potentially explode in a crash, according to NHTSA, which cites seven cases in the United States, another in Canada and one in Turkey. In two cases, drivers were killed while, in others, there were injuries.

ARC insists a recall is not needed.

An allegedly fatal inflator

During NHTSA’s meeting, Jacob Tarvis described the traumatic neck wound his mother, Marlene Beaudoin, sustained while driving her 2015 Chevy Traverse on an ice cream outing in 2021. The airbag exploded in a collision, causing cuts and bruises on her face and shoulders.

“The explosion was so forceful, it blew the steering wheel off, destroyed the steering column, and sent a fragmented, ragged piece of metal approximately 2 centimeters in diameter into the back of her neck.”

While he and other family members attempted to stop the profuse bleeding, his mother later died after being airlifted to a hospital, Tarvis said.

Air bags deploy in a crash when an electric charge sets off a chemical reaction inside a small inflator, causing gases to rush out and inflate the bag the instant a dangerous impact is detected. In a few cases, according to NHTSA, ARC air bag inflators could be blocked by small pieces of debris, stopping the gases from escaping as they should. This could cause the inflator to explode, sending bits of metal flying at vehicle occupants.

NHTSA started a preliminary investigation into the air bag inflators in 2015, following reports of inflators rupturing in a 2002 Chrysler Town & Country and a 2004 Kia Optima. There were more incidents in subsequent years. In May 2023, General Motors recalled 1 million GM vehicles with the air bags.

The air bag inflators involved in the investigation were made between 2000 and 2018, after which time ARC added steps to its manufacturing process to ensure there was no potential blockage. Delphi also manufactured air bags under license from ARC.

NHTSA estimated the risk of one of these inflators rupturing at one in every 370,000 air bag deployments. But officials said the only way to know if an air bag has the defect is for it to actually rupture.

“The only way to know if a particular inflator in this population will rupture is for it to undergo a deployment,” said Donna Glassbrenner, a statistician with NHTSA.

ARC has resisted issuing a broader recall, saying that the failure rate was within what could be expected, given the extremely high number of air bag inflators manufactured and installed.

An ARC executive called the injuries and deaths a “serious matter” but said neither the company nor any automaker who uses its assemblies “found a systemic defect across the 52 million inflators” identified by NHTSA.

“ARC takes the performance of its products very seriously,” said Steve Gold, vice president of product integrity at ARC. “Indeed, the safety of the motoring public is a cornerstone of our business.”

He argued that the ruptured inflators were “isolated incidents” and that the number is so small that ordering a recall is “simply unprecedented in the history of NHTSA.”

Previous airbag explosions

NHTSA pointed out that it requested Takata recall 67 million airbags following explosions in only six of them. (There were ultimately more.) Takata’s situation was different in that the ruptures were the result of chemicals in the inflators breaking down over time, particularly in areas with high heat and humidity. NHTSA and various automakers are still working to get vehicle owners to replace all the air bags involved in that recall.

Gold rejected any comparisons to the 2014 Takata recall — the largest automotive recall in US history — saying ARC has industry-standard quality protocols in place.

In a statement released Thursday, GM said it “believes the evidence and data presented by NHTSA at this time does not provide a basis for any recall beyond the approximately 1 million ARC inflators GM has already recalled out of an abundance of caution. Neither the affected automakers nor NHTSA, despite eight years of study and investigation, have identified a systemic design or manufacturing defect in ARC frontal airbag inflators.”

According to NHTSA, the air bags involved in its investigation were installed in vehicles made by BMW, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles — now part of Stellantis — Ford, GM, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Tesla, Toyota and Volkswagen.

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