The scope of the Takata airbag problems continue to widen, as Honda now says that a whopping 1.4 million cars, already with driver airbag issues, will also need their passenger side airbags replaced as well.
The automaker had previously only planned to replace the passenger airbags in 350,000 of those cars in humid areas of the country, which Takata reported were most at risk of problems.
While all recalled cars are repaired at no expense to the vehicle’s owner, the widened scope of the issue leads to serious questions about how much danger consumers have been in due to the faulty airbags.
That concern is front and center with the latest recall as the affected models, the 2001 to 2005 Civic and the 2003 to 2007 Accord, are among the best-selling cars in the country.
Airbag maker Takata initially attempted to limit the recalls to humid regions but was forced by U.S. safety regulators to recall all U.S. cars with the airbags.
The expansion makes the recall the largest in history, with a stunning 34 million cars now needing to be repaired. The recalls are spread across 15 separate brands and more than 60 different models of cars and trucks.
At least seven deaths have been confirmed to be a result of the exploding airbags, all of them involving driver airbags. Just last week Honda confirmed the seventh death tied to an exploding airbag, which involved Kylan Langlinais, a 22-year-old Lafayette, Louisiana woman who died in an April 5th accident. According to Honda she had been mailed a recall notice regarding her 2005 Honda Civic just three days prior to the accident.
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