Wall Street Journal: NHTSA believes Chinese aftermarket air bag parts connected to five deaths
The Wall Street Journal reports that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is investigating seven incidents in which a China-based company’s aftermarket air bag parts failed and ruptured during collisions, killing five people, one of whom was a young Florida mother of two.
The article states that NHTSA has connected Jilin Province Detiannuo Safety Technology, or DTN Airbag, to five incidents, including three deaths that occurred last year, and two this year, both fatal. One of the fatalities was in July, according to the WSJ.
“My message to the auto repair industry is clear: whoever is bringing this faulty Chinese equipment into the country and installing them is putting American families in danger and committing a serious crime,” said Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, according to the article.
He also warned the auto repair industry to be on the lookout for the defective air bags.
“Regulators and investigators say it is difficult to precisely determine how many of these fake air bag components have been installed in cars in the U.S.,” the article states. “Imitations can appear identical to genuine devices. Some counterfeits can sell for as little as $100 a piece, The Wall Street Journal has reported. An authentic air bag module can cost upward of $1,000. Drivers in need of an air bag should seek out a manufacturer-certified replacement, car companies and regulators say.”
The Automotive Anti-Counterfeiting Council (A2C2) told Repairer Driven News in June that the sale of counterfeit parts is still on the rise, trending upward following the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Most of the counterfeits that we’re seeing are being facilitated through online sales,” said Bob Stewart, A2C2 president and GM’s aftermarket service support and brand protection manager. “The original seller of the product usually originates from the Asia area — China, Hong Kong, Taiwan — through third-party facilitators.”
One part that continues to be counterfeited is air bags, which are very difficult to differentiate from legitimate ones, Stewart said.
He said that while A2C2 doesn’t conduct a lot of testing overall, they have focused on counterfeit air bag tests over the last two years.
In a video put together by A2C2, side-by-side crash tests of vehicles and air bag deployment show counterfeits fail to deploy properly compared to genuine OEM air bags.
The counterfeit bag burst apart and failed to protect the driver from a significant impact.
In July 2024, NHTSA urged used car buyers and owners to be aware of “cheap, substandard” replacement air bag inflators that can cause death or serious injury in a crash.
Three people had been killed and two people suffered life-altering, disfiguring injuries in the past nine months due to the faulty aftermarket replacement air bag inflators, according to NHTSA.
In all five cases, the vehicles had previously been involved in a crash, and their original equipment air bags were replaced with defective, substandard inflators; in most cases, confirmed to have been manufactured overseas, NHTSA said.
A couple of months prior, a lawsuit was filed over the Florida mother’s death. It alleges that Destiny Byassee was killed in a June 12, 2023, collision by a counterfeit driver-side air bag made by DTN when it “detonated like a grenade and shot metal and plastic shrapnel throughout the vehicle cabin.”
The suit states that Jilin Province Detiannuo Safety Technology Co. designs, manufactures, sells, distributes, and ships counterfeit air bags to the U.S., and Byassee’s 2020 Chevrolet Malibu was equipped with one by Jumbo Automotive and Haim Levy, the owner of the shop.
In 2022, the vehicle was involved in a collision that caused the front driver-side air bag and front driver-side seatbelt pretensioner to deploy,” the suit states. “The damage to the subject Chevy Malibu from the crash was so significant that the vehicle should have been classified as a total loss, issued a salvage title, and removed from service.
“After being involved in a crash that caused the subject Chevy Malibu’s front driver-side air bag and seatbelt pretensioner to deploy, the front driver-side air bag module and the front driver-side seatbelt pretensioner must be removed and replaced with new components that comply with federal standards and the manufacturer’s designed specifications for the vehicle.”
Instead, the Malibu was sold to Drivetime through Manheim Auto Auction, and Jumbo Automotive was hired to repair the vehicle before it was resold to Byassee, according to the complaint.
The case remains pending in Florida’s Broward County Seventeenth Judicial Circuit Court.
Images
Featured image credit: zhz_akey/iStock