On April 9, 2014, Toyota announced a massive global recall of nearly 6.4 million vehicles due to issues such as airbags failing to deploy and seats potentially shifting during a collision. Just weeks earlier, Toyota had agreed to pay the largest criminal fine ever levied against an automaker for concealing safety defects from Volkswagen.
This recall includes nearly 1.8 million vehicles in the U.S. market, bringing Toyota's total number of vehicle recalls in the U.S. in 2014 to nearly 2.9 million, with the recall numbers growing much faster than last year.
Analysts point out that the aforementioned announcement is a sign that Toyota is taking a more proactive approach to the recall, which involves numerous models and vehicles manufactured as far back as 2006. Last month, the U.S. Department of Justice concluded a four-year investigation into Toyota, finding that the company concealed information and failed to disclose defects that could cause sudden, unintended acceleration in several models, and accordingly imposed a $1.2 billion (approximately NT$36 billion) criminal penalty on Toyota.
"They made a very bold statement, indicating that Toyota will stick to its guns regardless of the impact of the recall," said Alec Gutierrez, senior analyst at automotive research firm Kelley Blue Book. "Toyota is seizing this opportunity to declare, 'We will thoroughly investigate and list all known issues, and recall as many as necessary.'"
Toyota stated that it is unaware of whether the two defects have caused any injuries or fatalities, and there is currently no indication that U.S. safety regulators have launched any investigations. Regarding the recalled vehicles in the U.S., Toyota stated it will perform maintenance and repair the airbag defects in 1.3 million vehicles and the seats in 472,500 vehicles.
Toyota submitted a report to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) regarding this recall, stating that the company had been tracking airbag issues since 2011 due to increasing consumer complaints. Although multiple Toyota models use the same airbag wiring harness, the company concluded in 2012 that certain characteristics of the Tacoma Pickup truck made it more prone to malfunctions. Toyota recalled approximately 481,000 Tacoma Pickup trucks in the United States at the end of 2014.
Toyota has been monitoring this issue and concluded this month that a larger-scale recall was necessary. Therefore, Toyota's second recall will address the problem with the driver's seat crossbar and the front passenger seat crossbar in some models.
Sources: The New York Times (2014-04-10) (Compiled by PIDC)
