GM Recalls 720,000 for Defective Airbags
This happened a few weeks ago but wanted to share it anyway as it impacts so a large number of vehicles. The story says that:
One recall covers about 570,000 Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups, as well as Chevrolet Suburban and Tahoe and GMC Yukon and Yukon XL sport utility vehicles, all built between February 1999 and February 2000.
Not good. Especially due to the age of the vehicle. These cars have been on the road for quite some time. Undoubtedly many people have been injured as a result.
A company spokesman declined to say whether those reports involved injuries or fatalities. But a U.S. government database of vehicle safety complaints from consumers shows 37 reports of air bags failing to deploy in crashes of the recalled vehicles. including 30 injuries and one fatality.
We don't have a good ratio for reports to incidents yet, but generally speaking, it is true that NHTSA's database is not a statistically significant sample of data yet. So, it is not unfair to guess that reports to incidents are in the neighborhood of 1 to 10 (or far more).
For North Carolinians, this is even more troubling. Should any of these vehicles cause a fatality, or worse, in North Carolina, the occupants are more than likely going to be barred from holding GM accountable. NC's rigid Statute of Repose limits claims against manufacturers of defective products to six years from the date of sale. Hopefully, evidence like this will push our legislature to make that statute much more reasonable.
