TAKATA WILL DECLARE 33.8 MILLION VEHICLES DEFECTIVE DUE TO EXPLODING AIRBAGS

A logo of Takata Corp is seen with its display at a
showroom for vehicles in Tokyo.

Takata will declare 33.8 million vehicles defective because they are equipped with airbags that can explode and spray occupants with shards of metal, various media outlets reported on Tuesday.

"U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx today announced that at the Department’s insistence, air bag manufacturer Takata has acknowledged that a defect exists in its air bag inflators," the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a statement.

"Takata has agreed to a national recall of certain types of driver and passenger side air bag inflators," NHTSA continued. "These inflators were made with a propellant that can degrade over time and has led to ruptures that have been blamed for six deaths worldwide. The action expands the number of vehicles to be recalled for defective Takata inflators to nearly 34 million."

This action expands the US Takata recall, adding 17 million vehicles to the previous 16 million total. It is among the most monumental recalls in US history and has captured the attention of Congress, which last year held hearings of the the matter.

Prior to Tuesday, 28 million vehicles had been recalled worldwide.

In the the US, Takata's reluctance to cooperate with the government has been costly.

"NHTSA in February began fining Takata $14,000 a day for not completely answering questions about air-bag inflater production and company efforts to investigate the explosions," Bloomberg's Jeff Plungis reported.

"It said at the time that most of the 2.4 million pages of documents the company had produced didn’t actually relate to the agency’s specific inquiries."

Bloomberg reported that Takata had agreed to larger fine with NHTSA, but didn't name a figure.


In a joint statement, US Senators Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts said that since "reports revealed Americans were dying as a result of exploding airbags made by Takata, we have been asking for a nationwide recall on all affected cars.

The statement continued: "The largest auto recall in history demands the strongest response possible to ensure our families and friends are protected from deadly airbags. ... NHTSA must ensure that the necessary parts are manufactured more quickly, and consumers deserve to know immediately whether or not the new parts are also defective, possibly requiring them to have their airbags fixed in another five years.”

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