InvestigateTV+ Weekend: Sacrificing Safety?
Season 6, Episode 3
(InvestigateTV) — A crash can change a life in seconds and in many American cars, a safety feature designed to keep front-seat passengers from hitting each other is still missing.
Plus, when deadly crashes keep happening, families want more than promises — they want safer streets before another life is lost.
Sacrificing Safety?
They’re an auto safety innovation in cars around the world: airbags that can protect you and your front-seat passenger from hitting each other in a side-impact crash. When drivers and front-seat passengers collide, the result can be serious head injuries or death. But even though those airbags were first introduced in the U.S., many cars here don’t have them. Why?
Crash tests in Europe in 2020 drove the adoption of those airbags, but the U.S. doesn’t do that type of testing. Authorities here question whether the airbags are necessary – but the world’s largest auto safety equipment supplier tells us lives are being lost unnecessarily due to the lack of airbags that manufacturers already know how to incorporate into their vehicles.
We’ll speak with one accident victim who says a front-center airbag could have prevented her from suffering a devastating head injury and the lifelong consequences.
A goal to end traffic deaths by 2050. Is it working?
More than 36,000 people were killed on American roads last year — according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration — a reminder that for too many families, a routine drive can end in tragedy.
In Phoenix, city leaders are trying to reduce deadly crashes — but acknowledge the work is far from done. Reporter Amy Cutler looks at the city’s safety plan, the gaps that remain, and one family’s loss.
Loud car modifications: What’s legal, what’s not
For many people, a quiet night at home or a meal outside can be interrupted in an instant by the roar of a revving engine or a backfiring exhaust.
In North Carolina — as in many states — vehicles must meet muffler and exhaust requirements. But police say catching violators can be difficult. Reporter Jamie Boll in Charlotte explains what’s legal, what isn’t, and why neighbors want action.
How ‘convenient spending’ could drain your budget
We all do it from time to time – shell out money to save a little time or make life easier. It’s called convenient spending.
In this Watching Your Wallet, Consumer Investigator Rachel DePompa shows us why convenience can act like a monthly trap, silently draining your budget.
Copyright 2026 Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved.
