1m airbags unfixed

Nearly one million cars with defective Takata airbags have yet to be remedied in Japan, figures released in January show. According to the country’s transport ministry, 32 per cent or 990,000 of the 3.05 million cars equipped with the Takata airbags remained unrepaired as of the end of January. Regarding the most recent recalls, 54 per cent of the estimated 140,000 vehicles recalled in November were still to be repaired, as of the end of January – along with 61 per cent of an extra 440,000 units added to the recall list in December. In the United States in January, a male driver of a car subject to a similar recall was killed in a crash. A Takata airbag in his car was found to have ruptured in an unusual way. Japan’s Ministry of Transport is urging automakers to speed up their repair or replacement of defective airbags to prevent similar accidents. “The faulty airbags can be life-threatening in an accident,” says a ministry official in charge of recall operations. “We want to proceed with the repairs as quickly as possible.”