AIRBAGS

Automakers started installing driver air bags in the late '80s, adding them on the passenger side in the early '90s, and in light trucks in the mid '90s. Since their development, air bags have saved thousands of lives. However, air bags can be extremely dangerous when infants or young children are seated in front of them.

Air bags protect drivers and passengers during frontal crashes and are designed to work together with seat belts. However, air bags and seat belts were designed to protect average-sized adult males, not children. That's why they pose a serious risk to children riding in the front seat.

To keep your older child (age 13 and up) safe in the front seat: 

• move the front seat as far back as possible from the dashboard
• teach your child not to lean forward to change the radio dial or to insert CDs
• insist that your child sit upright against the seatback, with the seat belt snug at all time.

The Air Bag System

• The air bag system includes the air bag itself, a sensor, and a diagnostic unit that controls the system. In a head-on crash, the vehicle's front-end crushes, absorbing crash energy and creating a softer stop for restrained occupants. 
• An unrestrained or loosely restrained person will continue to move forward at the same speed until hitting the car's interior. Properly restrained occupants come to a more gradual stop, along with the vehicle. 
• Air bags also help drivers and passengers come to a more gradual stop, preventing contact with a vehicle’s interior and distribute crash forces more broadly across the body than with a seat belt alone.
• As the crash happens, sensors send a signal to the air bag. 
• A chemical reaction produces harmless nitrogen gas that fills the bag and pushes it out of its compartment.
• The whole process takes only about 1/20th of a second. (Half the time it takes you to blink!) The air bag then starts to deflate as the gas disappears, absorbing crash energy.