Ever wonder how often air bags fail in cars? So did the Kansas City Star, and the answer was, far too often. The paper looked at U.S. fatal crash data, but since so many cars are common, the story could easily be updated with Canadian data.
Here’s how the first story began Oct. 20:

Brooke Katz died three months pregnant.
A hit-and-run motorist slammed into the front of the 2005 Dodge Caravan she was driving, spinning it 180 degrees.
“It’s one that sticks with me,” Atlanta Police Officer Shane Keller said recently. The crash was so violent that rescuers needed the Jaws of Life to free Katz, 27, a Georgia wife and mother who had just buckled herself in to go to work.
Then they saw something “curious,” as the officer put it. The Caravan’s airbags had not deployed.

You can view and download U.S. fatal accident data at the link below. You can also get complaints and defects data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.