Volkswagen will cooperate with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, spokesman Michael Franke wrote in an e-mail. VW informed NHTSA of the Missouri incident. A Takata spokesman, Jared Levy, said the company is investigating the incident and cooperating with NHTSA.
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The vehicle in question experienced a ruptured side airbag in a June crash when the driver struck a deer. The driver did not seek medical attention, and no police report was filed about the incident, which occurred in June, the spokesman said. The recalls were borne out of safety concerns due to ruptures in some airbag inflators made by Takata. The Japanese supplier also received a special order, the equivalent of a subpoena, from regulators requesting information about the incident and must respond by August 24. The orders to VW and Takata were reported earlier Monday by the Detroit News.
Although Volkswagen says no other Takata airbags have ruptured in any other VW models, NHTSA will get a list of all Volkswagen vehicles that contain airbags with ammonium nitrate. In the US alone the recalls have spread across 32 million vehicles – the biggest single product recall ever. Takata has said that the chemical appears to be one of many contributing factors into the air bag ruptures, along with flawed manufacturing processes. The problem has so far been linked to eight deaths and more than 100 injuries.
That same month, a Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV executive said the company made a permanent switch to an alternate inflator design from ZF TRW Automotive that doesn’t use ammonium nitrate as propellant. The company says phase-stabilized ammonium nitrate is a safe.
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Takata, at the center of an ongoing worldwide safety crisis has been recalling autos since 2008, alongside eleven automakers in the US and worldwide because of a defect with the airbag inflators, which can blow up with too much force and send metal debris inside the cabin at high velocity.
