225,000 Stellantis Vehicles Were Already Killing People. Now They Have Bombs in the Steering Wheel.

Stellantis is telling 225,000 people not to drive their cars. A Takata airbag inflator that can detonate with enough force to send metal shrapnel through the cabin is the reason. The fix takes about an hour at any authorized dealership and costs the owner exactly nothing. A quarter-million people have not bothered.

We pulled the FARS data for every affected model and model year on Stellantis's "do not drive" list. The Dodge Ram from 2003 through 2010 accounts for 1,989 of those deaths by itself. The Jeep Wrangler from 2007 to 2016 adds 702. Chrysler 300s from 2005 to 2015 contribute 579 more, and the Dodge Charger from 2006 to 2015 piles on 345.^[1] These vehicles were dangerous before anyone started worrying about their airbags.

Takata used ammonium nitrate as the propellant in its airbag inflators. Under normal conditions, the chemical generates a controlled gas burst that fills the bag in roughly 30 milliseconds. But ammonium nitrate absorbs moisture and degrades with repeated heat cycling. In the trunk of a Ram pickup that has baked through fifteen Texas summers, the propellant can become unstable enough to rupture the steel inflator housing on deployment.^[2] The housing fragments into jagged metal projectiles. The airbag that was supposed to save your life instead fires shrapnel at your face and chest from fourteen inches away.

NHTSA has confirmed at least 28 deaths and more than 400 injuries from this failure mode in the United States alone.^[3] Worldwide, the count is 36 dead. These numbers are almost certainly low, because a ruptured inflator in a high-speed frontal crash leaves evidence that is easy to attribute to the collision itself, and coroners in rural counties do not always order the metallurgical analysis needed to distinguish crash trauma from shrapnel wounds.

Stellantis has already replaced 6.6 million inflators across its Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, and Ram brands. That is an enormous logistical achievement, but the 225,000 holdouts represent a population of vehicles that is aging into peak danger. Ammonium nitrate degradation accelerates with time and thermal exposure. A 2005 Chrysler 300 sitting in a Phoenix driveway right now has spent twenty-one years cooking its propellant. Every summer that passes without a repair makes the next deployment more likely to be the last thing the driver experiences.

The Full Hit List

Stellantis's "do not drive" advisory covers ten nameplates spanning model years 2003 through 2016:^[4]

• 2003–2010 Dodge Ram: 1,989 FARS deaths in those model years
• 2007–2016 Jeep Wrangler: 702 FARS deaths
• 2005–2015 Chrysler 300: 579 FARS deaths
• 2006–2015 Dodge Charger: 345 FARS deaths
• 2005–2011 Dodge Dakota: 252 FARS deaths
• 2004–2009 Dodge Durango: 123 FARS deaths
• 2008–2014 Dodge Challenger: 81 FARS deaths
• 2005–2008 Dodge Magnum
• 2007–2009 Chrysler Aspen
• 2006–2009 Mitsubishi Raider

The 67 million recalled Takata inflators represent the largest automotive recall in American history. The company that built them no longer exists. Takata filed for bankruptcy in 2017, crushed under the weight of a defect that it knew about and concealed for years.^[2]

Limitations

The 4,071 FARS deaths cited here are from all fatal crashes involving these vehicle models and year ranges, not specifically from Takata inflator failures. FARS does not tag which crashes involved defective airbag deployments, so there is no clean way to isolate Takata-attributable fatalities from the overall crash toll. These vehicles appear in FARS because they are common, often driven hard, and in the case of older model years, increasingly lacking modern safety features like automatic emergency braking and electronic stability control. The Takata defect is a separate, additional risk layered on top of the baseline crash risk that FARS already documents.

The Strongest Case Against This Story

A skeptic would rightly point out that 28 confirmed Takata deaths versus 4,071 total FARS deaths makes the inflator defect a rounding error in the overall fatality picture for these vehicles. That is mathematically true. More Ram drivers will die this year from not wearing seatbelts than from a ruptured Takata inflator. But the two risks operate on fundamentally different moral axes. Crash deaths involve driver behavior, road conditions, and physics. Takata deaths involve a safety device that was engineered, sold, installed, and recalled while the manufacturer knew the propellant was unstable. One is a tragedy. The other is a product defect with a free fix sitting unclaimed at 225,000 dealerships.

What You Can Do

If you own any vehicle made between 2002 and 2016, check your VIN at nhtsa.gov/recalls. The tool takes thirty seconds. If a Takata recall appears, call your dealership and schedule the replacement immediately. Stellantis owners can also reach the company directly at 833-585-0144. That repair is free, takes about an hour, and eliminates the possibility that your airbag will kill you faster than the crash it is trying to protect you from.

Source: NHTSA FARS 2014–2023. Fatality rate estimated as deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled using FARS fatality counts and NHTS-derived fleet VMT estimates. Methodology and limitations at nhtsa.gov.