Keep Kids Safe From Dangers of Air Bags

In what it calls “an alarming trend,” the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration warned last week that the number of young children killed by air bags has increased rapidly and that more tragedies will occur if adults don’t adhere to guidelines about how to properly seat children in cars.

The agency said adults should adopt firm rules:

* Children should ride in the back seat, wearing seat belts or secured in a child safety seat.

* If children must ride in the front seat, belt them in (lap and shoulder) and move the seat back as far as it can go.

* Never put a rear-facing child safety seat in the front.

“We need solutions to this fairly quickly,” says NHTSA Administrator Ricardo Martinez. “The number of cars with passenger-side air bags . . . is getting higher and higher.”

Air bags have a good overall safety record, Martinez says; their use is credited with saving more than 900 lives since they were introduced in the late ‘80s. All passenger cars and light trucks must have driver and passenger air bags by 1999.

Part of the problem, Martinez says, is that too many children are not wearing seat belts. Studies show as many as 42% ride unrestrained. There are no surveys to show how often children ride in the front seat.

“We’re pretty astounded at the low seat belt use in children,” Martinez says.

“Having a crash at 30 mph is the same as jumping out a third-floor window. You move at the same speed. The fact that parents would put their children in a car unbelted makes me wonder if they realize what happens in a crash. When the car stops, you go forward. It’s basic science. [If unrestrained] you are stopped by the dashboard or you are ejected from the car.”

The potential for air bag injuries has been known for several years. Officials previously warned that infants strapped in rear-facing seats--the position recommended by safety experts--could be killed or severely injured if a front-seat air bag deploys.

In October, the agency said it had investigated the deaths of five children, ages 4 to 9, in which air bags deployed in crashes and caused the fatalities. But, last week, NHTSA said that the fatalities had climbed to more than a dozen.

In most cases, the child was sitting in the front seat without wearing a seat belt, although injuries have occurred in which the child was thought to be wearing only a lap belt. Because of pre-crash braking, the children were probably leaning close to the dashboard at the time the bag was deployed. An air bag unfurls at a velocity of more than 100 mph.

The deaths have been especially tragic because many occurred in low-speed crashes (less than 20 mph)--the kind of fender-benders that occur hundreds of times each day.

Even small adults can be injured by air bags if their seat is too close to the steering wheel. The NHTSA recommends that drivers adjust their seats so they are at least six to eight inches from the wheel.