The Citroën group asked more than 230,000 users of C3 and DS 3 models on Monday February 17 to no longer use their vehicle until you replace Takata Airbags, declared dangerous. The brand has contracted its concessions, garages and factories to deal with demand. This is the case in the Doubs.
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Takata airbags have not finished talking. They are the cause of a total arrest of more than 230,000 Citroën C3 and DS 3 vehicles, issued on Monday, February 17 by the group’s general manager Thierry Koskas. Already called upon to go to the garage for checks and a replacement last January, vehicles registered between 2008 and 2013 are now immobilized in the face of the dangerousness of airbags.
This airbag model has already killed several people in France, including one in mainland France. Citroën had already recalled vehicles in the south of France in 2024, as well as in the south of Europe and in the Maghreb. A “degradation of the properties” of the ammonium nitrate present in the airbags, which is used in particular to swell them in the event of an accident, would be the cause of this arrest of vehicles.
Concerned by the reminder last month of her Citroën C3, Catherine hastened to order new airbags for her vehicle. “When I saw the latest information, I immediately called the Citroën dealer de Belfort. They don’t have any news, I don’t have an appointment for the moment, but I think they have a lot of requests, “she admits. Forced to use her car for her professional trips, she continues to drive with, not without fear. “I think about it all the time when I drive, I’m not serene. We don’t want the airbag to explode us in the face.”
Isabelle is part of the users affected by the total stop of her vehicle and must replace the airbags of her DS 3 as soon as possible. “During the review of my car last month, my mechanic warned me by pointing out that my dashboard was starting to be split.” Bisontine quickly immobilizes his car, but finds himself faced with a lack of responsiveness from the brand. “I have called the Citroën Garage of Besançon several times, they told me that they had an appointment to offer me. How I do now?”, She deplores.
Faced with the impressive number of cars concerned, the Citroën group has used eight of its factories in the northern part of France, including that stellantis of Sochaux in the Doubs. “Our site was asked to maximize the recovery of vehicles and limit expectations,” explains Monique Jeanneaux, communications manager of the Stellantis factory in Sochaux.
Since February 10, customers can make an appointment in the ephemeral workshop installed near the country factory in Montbéliard. With a capacity of 40 places per day, “making appointments now accelerates that information has gone well”. Dedicated only to the replacement of defective Takata airbags, the workshop will remain open “as long as there is demand”. New airbag stocks are full and replacement management is completely free.
Like Sochaux, other factories in the group have opened ephemeral repair workshops to cope with the demand wave. It will be possible to replace, by appointment, the airbags of the Citroën C3 and DS 3 on the Stellantis sites of Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine), Poissy (Yvelines), Mulhouse (Haut-Rhin), Trémery (Moselle), Charleville-Meizières (Ardennes), Hordain (North), Douvrin (Pas-de-Calais).
To make an appointment at the Ephemeral Sochaux repair workshop, contact 06.45.85.88.05