When it comes to safety in cars, the first thing that comes to mind is usually airbags. Many automobile manufacturers, on the other hand, prefer to buy these airbags from known and reliable brands instead of producing them themselves.
Takata, which was seen as one of the high quality and reliable brands for a period, caused the death of 23 people between 2000 and 2017 due to the airbag mechanisms inflated with ammonium nitrate in the late 1990s. Today, it turned out that an airbag produced by Takata killed another individual.
This airbag is often found in older cars.
The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration confirmed in a statement yesterday that another person died due to Takata airbags. These deaths are usually caused by the sudden explosion of the ammonium nitrate inflation mechanism used in the airbag or the failure of the airbag to deploy in the event of an accident.
It was determined that the inflation mechanism of the airbag exploded in a 2010 Chrysler 300 accident. Ammonium nitrate, a highly explosive compound, explodes instead of reacting due to the electrical current in the inflation mechanism of the airbags, causing the death of drivers.
So why are these tools still used?
Following the investigations opened against the Japanese automotive giant Takata in 2010 and 2015, both automobile manufacturers and people who lost their relatives sued Takata and won. In 2017, the company declared bankruptcy and was acquired by Key Safety Systems, one year later, based in the USA. After purchasing Takata, KSS destroyed the ammonium nitrate airbags and started using the company’s resources to produce standard airbags.
However, despite all these, Takata airbags are used in many models of brands such as Audi, BMW, Honda, Daimler, Fiat, Ferrari, Ford, General Motors, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru, Toyota and Volkswagen between 2000 and 2015. Some manufacturers only use Takata products in their US models, while some models have these deadly airbags on models all over the world.
Although many automobile manufacturers called the models with these airbags to service and changed the airbags, the workshops in some countries remained silent on this issue.
If you are driving a car between 2000-1015, you can find out which airbag your car uses with a short internet search. If your vehicle is equipped with Takata airbags, contact your workshop as soon as possible and request that these airbags be replaced.
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