Following the confirmation of another fatality involving a defective Takata airbag inflator, Stellantis is urgently asking the owners of 2003 Dodge Rams to stop driving their vehicles until an airbag recall replacement has been completed.
The accident occurred on May 13, 2023, when a 2003 Dodge Ram 1500 was involved in a collision that caused its airbags to deploy. The front passenger-side occupant died as a result of serious injuries that Stellantis says were “consistent with those observed in previous Takata inflator fatalities.”
Stellantis estimates that 29,000 Dodge Rams from the 2003 model year are still on the roads in the U.S. despite not having had their Takata recalls performed. The automaker says that free replacement inflators have been available for nearly 10 years.
Read: Stellantis Confirms Third Takata Airbag Death, Urges 274,000 Owners To Get Repairs
Unfortunately, the 2003 Ram isn’t the only model whose owners must get their vehicles fixed. According to Reuters, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimates that roughly 84,000 Dodge Ram pickup trucks remain unrepaired.
Meanwhile, Stellantis continues to urge the drivers of a total of 233,000 vehicles across its Dodge and Chrysler brands to stop driving their vehicles until a new airbag inflator can be installed. According to NHTSA, the occupants of “unrepaired vehicles are at grave risk of serious injury or death.”
Although this is the first known Takata-related fatality in a Ram vehicle, it is the fourth in a Stellantis model. The automaker says that since 2014, it has made more than 210 million outreach attempts and replaced more than 6.1 million Takata inflators.
For owners of vehicles whose airbags have not yet been replaced, the repair is free, and Stellantis can arrange for transportation to a dealership, in order to prevent you from having to drive your vehicle at all, before the inflator is replaced. Owners are encouraged to call 833-585-0144 to organize their appointment.
