We recently posted an article on the safety standards of new cars, asking the question of when safety will become a standard feature for all new cars. In this we highlighted several cars on sale currently with no safety features, but the stand out was the Datsun GO, not only for its freshness on the market, but due to the recent Global NCAP results that deemed it unsafe, stating that even airbags would not help protect its inhabitants.
In light of this the chairman of Global NCAP, Max Mosley, has written a letter to the president of the Nissan Motor Company airing his concerns over the GO’s lack of safety credentials – in particular its flimsy body structure the crumpled at a mere 64km/h in testing.
In this letter, he also stated that “it is extremely disappointing that Nissan has authorised the launch of a brand new model that is so clearly substandard. As presently engineered the car will certainly fail to pass the United Nation’s frontal impact regulation (UN R.94). In these circumstances I would urge you to withdraw the Datsun Go from sale in India (and any other markets where it is being sold) pending a redesign of the car’s body-shell to make it worthwhile to fit airbags.”
In the letter, which can be seen below, it was also highlighted that Nissan had twice been asked in the past to voluntarily apply to the UN’s minimum crash safety test standards, but on both occasions the request from Global NCAP was ignored.
With much discussion on the matter of late, this recommendation from such a pertinent safety body is one that should surely raise awareness to the levels of safety in the GO. Whether or not Nissan and Datsun heed this recommendation is still to be seen, but something as major as this so soon after global launch spells bad news for the Datsun brand.
