Air Bag On-off Switch Problems of SAAB 9-3

The contact owns a 2006 SAAB 9-3. The contact stated that the air bag light remained illuminated. The air bag light switch was replaced by a SAAB dealer. In addition, the steering wheel lock failed. The dealer informed the contact not to drive the vehicle. The ignition was replaced. There had been no further occurrences. The failure mileage was 32,000.

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The driver of the 1999 SAAB 9-3 was driving in the left lane on MA rte. 128 south. Her son was in a child carseat tightly belted into the driver's side passenger seat, the seat directly behind the driver. The switch on the belt buckle was set to the "child seat" setting. The driver signaled and began to change lanes to the middle lane which was clear of traffic. As she was shifting lanes, another vehicle, a light-colored sedan, began to move sharply into the middle lane from the right. The driver was forced to swerve to the left to avoid collision with the other vehicle, and her car went out of control. The car went off the road to the left and hit the guardrail in a front-end collision. The driver was thrown forward but was wearing her seatbelt, which held her. Her airbag did not inflate. Her son's car seat did not remain in place, but went forward and tipped over on its side, facing the middle of the car, so that when the driver opened the passenger door to check on her son, at first she couldn't see him, and she had trouble extracting the car seat. An off-duty fireman stopped to help, cut the seat belt and extracted the seat. The driver was taken to the hospital and treated for whiplash; her son does not appear to have sustained injury. The car was declared a total loss by the insurer, and the insurer towed the car and wants to dispose of it. We (the driver and her husband) contacted SAAB several times to ask that the vehicle be examined prior to disposal to address concerns about the performance of the rear seat belt and the driver's airbag; SAAB was unhelpful.

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