Motorists Scared By Air Bags Swamp Regulators To Have Devices Unhooked; Most Denied

Federal regulators, while working on new regulations to allow mechanics to disconnect air bags, are denying requests from hundreds of frightened motorists who want the devices disabled immediately.

In the last several months, the government’s highway safety agency has received nearly 800 letters seeking waivers that would allow a mechanic to legally disconnect the safety devices, officials said Thursday.

But only 80 waivers have been granted, all to people who cited medical problems, the officials said. The others, they said, will have to wait until the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration issues the new regulations, expected by mid-1997.

Until this year, officials said, the agency had received only a few requests for waivers to disconnect the devices and had granted only seven of them, all for medical reasons.

Some of the letters the agency received were from adults who were shorter and feared they sat too close to the air bag. Others cited their age, while another group said a child sat in the front passenger-side seat.

“One of the purposes of the proposal is to eliminate the need for people to petition their government for this permission,” Phil Recht, NHTSA’s deputy administrator, said Thursday.

Air bags have saved more than 1,600 lives but also have been blamed for the deaths of 32 children and 20 adults - mostly smaller women. As the toll has risen, the efficacy of the devices and the once-unbridled advocacy of them by the government, automakers and safety groups has been met with increasing skepticism.

For years, the government has said the devices should be used with seat belts and in recent months it has waged a public information campaign stressing that children under 13 should sit in back seats.

Recht said many people were frightened or nervous about the air bags but when they talked to agency personnel and learned more details about air bags they “regained comfort with the air bags.”

The prosed regulation includes literature a consumer must read before an air bag is disconnected, a consent form to sign and warning labels if a bag has been disconnected.