CRASH RESULTS
Cars are getting smaller, and as an injury attorney, this
worries me. While safety systems are much improved, you just cannot beat basic
physics. Small cars are cheaper to own and operate, as they get better mileage,
and they are quite easy to get around parking lots.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety crashes millions
of dollars of perfectly good new cars to gauge how well they might protect
their occupants. They once simply crashed head on into barriers like most
government tests still do. This spread the forces over a maximal area.
However, to their credit, they have recently made some
frontal impact crash tests slightly off center. These focus force on one front
corner, at 40 m.p.h. I think this better indicates the real world case of a
drunk crossing the centerline slightly. It has also revealed what I had
predicted: small cars are generally more dangerous.
The front end of a car usually has a “crush zone.” Often,
small notches are cut into the frame that allow it to crumple. This dissipates
the force more slowly, which is better for the occupants. However, the newer
corner impact tests seem to mostly bypass this crumple zone, and this puts the
passenger compartment at risk.
I am not even familiar with many of the newest smaller
models, all under 2,500 lbs. I still lope around in my immense, gas-guzzling
5,000 lb.+ Suburban. But out of almost a dozen cars, only one known as the
“Chevy Spark” was even acceptable. None
were ranked “good.” The subcompacts that did not even make the “acceptable” cut
included subcompact cars from Toyota, Kia, Hyundai, Nissan, Mitsubishi, Mazda,
Fiat and Honda. Safety ratings can be deceptive. A large SUV and a small sedan
might share identical safety ratings, but they are rating cars within the same
size class.
In general, occupants heavy cars and trucks come out better
in a crash. Large, heavy vehicles, like my behemoth SUV, long, wide crumple
zones, and often shove the lighter car backward at impact. Thus, the rates of
driver deaths are higher for the lighter vehicles. Midsize and large SUVs are
safest, as SUVs are also not prone to under-ride another vehicle in a crash,
while risk of roll over is still significant.
Drive safely.
No amount of safety equipment can truly protect
any of us from a distracted driver.
No comments:
Post a Comment