cheryl
Administrator
Staff member
The Hidden Risks of Used Cars - Consumer Reports
CR Investigates: Dealers are selling used cars with open recalls to unsuspecting consumers. Here’s how to protect yourself.
Armando Vargas-Ortega had bought his 2002 Honda Civic just three months earlier. While driving on the outskirts of Phoenix one evening last June, Vargas-Ortega, 54, collided with a Jeep that had run a stop sign.
His wife, in the passenger seat, survived with only minor injuries after her airbag activated, as it’s meant to. But Vargas-Ortega’s airbag malfunctioned. Instead of cushioning the blow, it ejected a piece of metal, lacerating the carotid artery in his neck and covering the driver’s seat with “copious amounts of blood,” according to the police report. Vargas-Ortega died in the hospital three days later.
The death is the most recent fatality—the 16th in the U.S. and 24th worldwide—known to be linked to airbags made by the now-bankrupt Japanese car-parts manufacturer Takata. A faulty part—the airbag inflator—led to the largest, most complex auto recall in history. The recall now affects 19 automakers and 183 models, covering a total of 56 million airbags in nearly 42 million vehicles. (Learn more about the Takata airbag recall.)
CR Investigates: Dealers are selling used cars with open recalls to unsuspecting consumers. Here’s how to protect yourself.
Armando Vargas-Ortega had bought his 2002 Honda Civic just three months earlier. While driving on the outskirts of Phoenix one evening last June, Vargas-Ortega, 54, collided with a Jeep that had run a stop sign.
His wife, in the passenger seat, survived with only minor injuries after her airbag activated, as it’s meant to. But Vargas-Ortega’s airbag malfunctioned. Instead of cushioning the blow, it ejected a piece of metal, lacerating the carotid artery in his neck and covering the driver’s seat with “copious amounts of blood,” according to the police report. Vargas-Ortega died in the hospital three days later.
The death is the most recent fatality—the 16th in the U.S. and 24th worldwide—known to be linked to airbags made by the now-bankrupt Japanese car-parts manufacturer Takata. A faulty part—the airbag inflator—led to the largest, most complex auto recall in history. The recall now affects 19 automakers and 183 models, covering a total of 56 million airbags in nearly 42 million vehicles. (Learn more about the Takata airbag recall.)