2002 Lexus SC

The 2002 Lexus SC has 3 recalls, all involving the front passenger airbag inflator, which can rupture in a crash and send metal fragments into the cabin, risking serious injury or death.

These three recalls all trace to the same defect in the Takata-supplied passenger frontal airbag inflator. When the airbag deploys in a collision, the inflator can explode beyond its designed pressure limits, tearing apart its metal housing and scattering fragments toward the driver and passengers. One filing specifically targets vehicles that spent time in high-humidity regions such as Florida, the Gulf Coast, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and several U.S. territories, where prolonged moisture exposure accelerates the propellant degradation that makes rupture more likely. The other filings extend the same concern to a broader population of vehicles regardless of where they were registered. All three recalls address the same underlying danger, and prior repair attempts on some vehicles did not fully resolve the issue, which is why multiple campaigns exist for what is essentially one faulty component.