General Motors Expands Ignition Switch Recall
General Motors doubled the scope of a recall it issued earlier this month, from about 619,000 U.S. vehicles to nearly 1.4 million. At least 13 front-seat occupants of smaller sized GM cars have died in crashes where the air bags did not deploy due to faulty ignition switches. If the ignition key is jarred or weighed down by a heavy key chain, the ignition switch could unexpectedly turn off the engine and disable the electrical system so the air bags do not deploy. GM’s initial recall included only 2005 – 2007 Chevrolet Cobalts and 2007 Pontiac G5 models. The expanded recall includes 4 additional models (2003-2007 Saturn Ions, 2006-2007 Chevrolet HHRs, 2006 – 2007 Pontiac Solstice, and 2006 – 2007 Saturn Sky models) all of which were mentioned in a 2006 technical service bulletin to the dealerships, leading many to question whether GM recalled these vehicle quickly enough.