#SalvageCars

From the Texas coast to Georgia, the southern U.S. took a long-delayed pounding this summer after years of hurricane “drought.” Hurricane Harvey struck, then lingered for days, over the Corpus Christi-Houston area in late August, sending hundreds of thousands of vehicles to the salvage yard. Hurricane Irma followed shortly thereafter, striking Florida before moving up into the southeastern states.

Perhaps aware of Texas’ reputation, Harvey cut the largest swath through the country’s rolling stock, with roughly 422,000 insured vehicles now awaiting salvage auctions. Irma’s wrath adds a further 215,000 to the flood-damaged mix. For the National Insurance Crime Bureau, it’s not necessarily those vehicles that are leading to restless nights — it’s ones with owners unable to make an insurance claim.

Ignore what some of the congenital liars in the autojourno game are saying: Most of the cars that were flooded out during recent weather events will not be “immediately crushed.” That would be utterly ridiculous. Some flood vehicles will wind up being comprehensively parted out to end users who might never need to know about the watery provenance of their secondhand parts. Does it really matter if the OEM aluminum wheels you buy off eBay were ever in a flood? What about that side marker light? You get the idea.

On the other hand, some cars will be processed, primped, and placed back in a sales channel with or without the mark of Cain on their titles. Which leads us to a question:

We discussed the general process of repairing a salvage car a few weeks ago and one commenter asked about airbags. Joe Btfsplk writes:

How do you deal with deployed airbags? Are used parts allowed to be used in salvage vehicles? This seems to get little attention in the article.

Dealing with deployed airbags in modern cars can be a tricky and costly situation. The installation of used parts is allowed but may not always be the safest solution.