Missing Airbags: Is Your Life at Risk in a Dallas Car Crash?

Will your car's airbag protect you in the event of a Dallas car accident?
The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) has posted a warning about the danger of missing airbags.  How common is the problem? According to the NHTSA, one in every five accidents involves an airbag that is either defective or missing. How can you know that your air bag will be there in a Dallas car crash?
The Problem
The NHTSA noticed an increasing number of fatal accidents involved air bags that did not deploy. In 2008, the agency published a study of 1,446 traffic deaths that occurred between 2001 and 2006; 255 of the deaths involved airbags that did not deploy when they should have. Those airbags were missing.
What happened to the airbags?
Airbags are among the most valuable of car parts.  The cost of replacing an airbag ranges from $1,000 to $1,500. This has led to a market for stolen and counterfeit airbags.
When a car is taken to a repair shop after a Dallas car accident, unscrupulous mechanics may deploy or even pull out the airbags to make it look like the airbags deployed during the accident. The insurance adjuster examines the car and gives an estimate for the airbag replacement.  The airbags are either not replaced or are replaced with counterfeit bags.
In other cases, mechanics just pull out the undeployed airbags and replace them with used airbags, counterfeit airbags, or no airbag at all.  In some cases, the space where the airbag should be is filled with plastic bags, cardboard, or even garbage.  The undeployed airbags are then sold.
Every year over two million vehicles are declared total losses by insurance companies.  These vehicles are given salvage titles, which means that the vehicles are considered unsafe to operate in many states. Yet more than 40 percent of salvage vehicles are rebuilt and resold.  These cars are often missing airbags or are refitted with airbags from stolen or crashed vehicles.  Because the airbag doesn’t match the make, model, or year of the repaired vehicle, the airbag may not properly deploy in a Dallas auto accident.
If you are injured in a car crash in Texas and your airbag fails to deploy, you may be able to file an injury claim against the car dealer or mechanic who sold or repaired your car.  Contact the Rasansky Law Firm at (214) 651-6100 to learn more.
Protect your rights after your Dallas car wreck, Request a free copy of our book, Accident Claim Do’s and Don’ts.