Parents' Group Petitions NHTSA for Stronger Airbag Warnings

07/23/96

The Parents' Coalition for Air Bag Warnings petitioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) today to mandate stronger air bag warnings.

Because children continue to be killed by the deployment of passenger side airbags, the coalition wants NHTSA to require a warning on the dashboard that states: "WARNING. DO NOT SEAT CHILDREN IN THE FRONT SEAT. AIR BAG DEPLOYMENT CAN CAUSE SERIOUS INJURY OR DEATH TO CHILDREN."

The coalition also wants manufacturers to mail a sticker with this warning to owners of vehicles that have passenger side air bags. According to the petition, NHTSA has the authority to immediately require these warnings.

Robert Sanders, co-founder of the coalition said, "the public is unaware of the immediate and real danger of air bags to children. The warnings we propose will correct this problem and save children's lives."

The coalition released the following fact sheet about the dangers that air bags pose to children:

           FACT SHEET:  DANGERS OF AIR BAGS TO CHILDREN

    In a series of articles during the week of July 8, 1996, USA Today
identified the following facts about the dangers of air bags to
children:

    * 23 children under the age of twelve have been killed by passenger
side air bags since 1993.
    * Most of the deaths occurred in low-speed collisions in which
everyone else walked away.
    * Passenger side air bags are killing twice as many children as they
are saving.
    * 20 children are expected to be killed by passenger side air bags
in 1996.  After passenger side air bags become mandatory in 1998, it is
expected that air bags will kill a child a week, or 52 per year.
    * Most of the child deaths will be of children who are either not
belted or are improperly belted, but that is the very group air bags
were designed to save.
    * There is disturbing evidence that even properly belted children
are being injured and killed by air bags.  Martin Eichelberger, a
Washington, D.C. pediatric surgeon studying crashes involving children,
has reported serious injuries to two fully belted children.  National
Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators know of a fully belted
child who was killed by an air bag.
    * The auto industry has been aware for years of the danger of air
bags to children.  In 1969 General Motors stated that air bags should
not be mandated because "a small child close to the instrument panel
from which an air cushion is deployed may, in our present estimation,
be severely injured or even killed."
.    * A 1974 Volvo report, "Possible Effects of Airbag Inflation on a
Standing Child," used baby piglets as surrogates for children three to
six years old standing near dashboards and not wearing safety belts.
The piglets were positioned 4 to 6 inches from the passenger air bag
and subjected to the equivalent of 17.5 mph crashes.  Eight of the
24 piglets were killed by the air bags; 13 were badly injured.
    * Lee Iacocca, former CEO of Chrysler, stated in his 1984
autobiography that "air bags are one of those areas where the solution
may actually be worse than the problem."  Iacocca cited a retired safety
engineer in Michigan who applied for a patent for a device that used air
bags as a quicker, more humane way to kill convicts than hanging or the
electric chair.
    * Despite the industry's knowledge of the danger of air bags,
consumer demand grew, fueled by slow-motion TV ads showing puffy bags
popping from the dashboard to gently cradle occupants.  In real life,
the bags are violent and deadly.  Accident investigators describe the
force of the passenger side air bag as the equivalent of a heavy weight
boxer bashing a child in the face.

Paul Dever -- The Auto Channel