Seatbelts and Airbags: They Save Lives!!! Seatbelts can be defined as straps designed to hold a person safely in a seat. When a person uses a seatbelt and that person is in an accident, the person can be badly injured but they will still survive the accident. But when seatbelts are used in combination with an airbag, the likelihood that the person is going to survive the accident goes up. If a person is in an accident in a car with an airbag, and that person is not wearing his/her seatbelt, the airbag is going to injure the person badly. Seatbelts help reduce the speed that a person hits the airbag there