U.S. government safety officials urged Tuesday that aircraft owners be required to retrofit small planes with shoulder-lap seat belts but stopped short of calling for the installation of air bags.

A three-year study of small plane accidents released by the National Transportation Safety Board found several cases in which air bags prevented serious injuries or fatalities. But investigators said that since only about 7,000 planes have air bags, there haven’t been enough accidents to judge whether they should be required on all planes. Get the full story »