Airbag inflates in crash test (©AP Photo/The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety)

Driver dies from airbag fumes two months after crash

5/29/2012

​June Smith said she had a feeling all along it was the airbag that killed her husband -- in particularly the chemicals he inhaled when the bag was slashed open in a car crash in England last November. Smith, a 59-year-old father of two, was injured in the accident and died two months later. But an inquest has found that his death was attributed to bronchial pneumonia and pulmonary fibrosis that developed by breathing the airbag's noxious brew. His widow said, "It's just not fair that you have to lose someone because of something that is meant to save a life." Smith was driving a Vauxhall Insignia. A Vauxhall spokesman said the company will investigate.

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