NHTSA Under The Gun Again Over Handling Of Takata Airbag Recall
Not long after undergoing scrutiny over its part of the February 2014 General Motors ignition switch recall, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration once again is under the gun, this time in its handling of the Takata airbag crisis.
Automotive News reports that the agency’s mostly hands-off approach, allowing automakers to use field actions to recall vehicles in a handful of states and territories where the possibility for catastrophic failure is greatest, is following the same track as the one that ultimately led GM to recall 2.6 million vehicles made in the early to mid-2000s, though on a greater scale.
Additionally, the NHTSA hasn’t ordered Takata itself to recall its defective airbags, mainly as it waits for more data to confirm the airbags are likely to act more like Claymores than safety devices under high humidity. In fact, the two parties entered into an agreement in June where affected automakers would conduct said field actions in only areas where those conditions are most prevalent — such as Florida and Puerto Rico, where six reports of failure were recorded. The airbags collected would then be tested, with the results sent to investigators.
As the recall widens its net further, the NHTSA is being investigated by the U.S. Department of Transportation, whose secretary, Anthony Foxx, received a letter from Senators Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Ed Markley of Massachusetts — both heavy critics of the NHTSA’s handling of the GM recall — urging Foxx to order the agency to be more assertive:
NHTSA should immediately issue a nationwide safety recall on all the affected cars, regardless of where the car is registered. We have become increasingly troubled and alarmed by the confusing and conflicting advice being issued by NHTSA and the glacial pace of the agency’s response to this public safety threat.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan, still investigating the GM recall, is now ordering an investigation into the Takata recall.
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Yet another media circus. I read yesterday that more Americans had married Kim Kardashian than had died from Ebola. Same deal; it's all about ratings.
I think this is a good thing. Doing recalls just because the car is currently registered in an area with a humid climate ignores all potential past usage of that vehicle. How long does it need to be exposed before becoming an issue? Will my family trip to Florida for a week potentially cause a problem? It's clear that this recall is seriously lacking data, and relying on the recall itself to generate the data by deploying the replaced bags. The issue here is that you'll never know it's defective until it's too late. Given the relatively low deployment percentage of a vehicle population, it is probably tough for them to extrapolate the statistics on this one. Takata showed some pretty disturbing lack of production control in their manufacturing plant. Quite frankly, this is shocking coming from a Japanese company, but this isn't the first time Takata has cost manufacturers plenty. Back in the 80s, Takata forgot to put UV stabilizer in the plastics used in their seatbelt release buttons. This would cause the plastic to disintegrate into the buckle and prevent secure latching of the belt.