Audi Recalls 850,000 A4 Sedans and Wagons Globally for Air-Bag Issue

Audi has issued a global recall for 850,000 of its A4 sedans and wagons to fix a problem with air bags not deploying, the company announced Thursday.

The recall affects 101,900 A4, S4 and Allroad wagons in the U.S. from the 2013 through 2015 model years. An additional 15,100 Audis in Canada are included, the company said.

The issue is tied to the vehicles’ air-bag software, which in rare cases can cause the air bags to fail to deploy in the event of a crash. No accidents or injuries have been caused by the issue in the U.S., according to Audi spokesman Brad Stertz.

Audi notified dealers Thursday about the issue, and will begin alerting owners in the coming weeks. Affected vehicles will need to have a software update installed, which will take about 20 minutes, Stertz said.

The issue is not related to the recent spate of recalls of 7.8 million vehicles in the U.S. that have faulty air bags manufactured by Takata Corp., since Audi doesn’t use air bags from the Japanese supplier, Audi said.

The air bags made by Takata could possibly fail or spontaneously explode, sending metal fragments into the passenger compartment of the vehicle. Although the bulk of the defective Takata air bags are in Honda vehicles, Toyota, BMW, Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Mitsubishi, Nissan and Subaru vehicles have also been linked to them.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration took the rare step on Wednesday of recommending that owners of the vehicles involved in the Takata air-bag recall contact their dealers immediately to see whether they need to have their air bags checked or replaced.

This article appeared in print in the October 24th, 2014 edition of Hamodia.