The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced that an eighth fatality in the U.S. has been linked to a defective air bag made by Takata, marking the first reported death since April and the ninth worldwide.
The auto safety agency also said it named a former US Justice Department official to oversee the massive recalls of airbags and the Japanese parts firm's compliance with a settlement.
NHTSA spokesman Gordon Trowbridge told reporters on a conference call that the death took place in July in a recalled used 2001 Honda Accord coupe near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The unidentified teen-aged driver was hospitalized after the Takata airbag ruptured. The teen died several days later.
NHTSA also said that several manufacturers will add "a few hundred thousand vehicles" to the massive recall campaigns.
"This young person’s death is tragic and it underscores why we are continuing to work so hard" to take care of recalls, Trowbridge said, adding that most rupture fatalities occur in cases that would otherwise be “easily survivable” accidents.
The company added: “We are continuing to work closely with NHTSA and our automaker customers, to do everything we can to advance vehicle safety."
About 23 million passenger- and driver-side airbag inflators manufactured by Takata have been recalled after automakers discovered the inflators were prone to rupture, spraying metal shrapnel into the cab. The recall, the largest in U.S. history, affects about 19 million vehicles.
