It followed an announcement last week by another agency to recall more than 230,000 Ford Rangers built from 2004 to 2006. NHTSA said those vehicles may have replacement airbags that were incorrectly installed during the original Ranger recall.
Owners can enter their vehicle identification numbers on NHTSA website To see if their vehicles are subject to the warning.
“If you have a 2000-2006 BMW with a Takata air bag, get it fixed right away — for free,” NHTSA deputy director Sophie Schulman said in a statement. “These inflatable devices are now two decades old, and with each passing day, they are becoming more and more dangerous because they can explode even on a minor impact.”
The NHTSA said the air bags had a defective bellows that could explode or not inflate properly when deployed.
In November, Dodge and Chrysler announced “no drive” orders due to the detonated air bag issue.
Separately, tens of millions of vehicles are covered by an ongoing recall that carries the risk of Takata airbags exploding, but additional airbag problems are still being discovered. Takata was forced into bankruptcy in 2017 due to all the scandals, problems, and lawsuits resulting from it, and pleaded guilty to criminal wrongdoing. NHTSA has forced a recall of at least 67 million Takata airbags since 2013. In 2018 Takata agreed to pay $650 million to settle lawsuits brought by dozens of states over the airbags.
Joyson Safety Systems, which acquired most of Takata’s assets in 2018, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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