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The "Seven Steps Method" is an analysis and classification system, which describes the human participation factors and their causes in the temporal sequence (from the perceptibility to concrete action errors) taking into consideration the logical sequence of individual basic functions. By means of the "seven steps" it is possible to describe the relevant human causes of accidents from persons involved in the accident in an economic way with a sufficient degree of exactitude, because the causes can be further differentiated in their value (e.g. diversion as external diversion with regard to impact due to surroundings) and their sub values (e.g. external diversion with regard to impact due to surroundings in the shape of a "capture" of the perception by a prominent object of the traffic environment). Theoretically it is possible that one or more causing moments can be assigned to a person involved in an accident in each of the "seven steps"; however it is also possible to sufficiently clarify the cause in only one level (examples for this are described). In the practice of accident investigation at the site of the accident, the sequence chart is also relevant. With its assistance the questioning of the people involved in an accident can be accomplished in a structured way by assigning a set of questions to each step.
The European Union has set a target to reduce all road fatalities (over 40,000) with 50% in 2010. This target percentage remained unchanged with the introduction of the ten new member states within the EU as by May 1st, 2004. According to Eurostat, 34% of all fatalities in 1998 in the, then, fifteen states of the European Union were the result of single vehicle collisions. This represents over 14,000 lives lost each year of which many can likely be saved through better roadside infrastructure design. The challenge for road safety professionals is to find methods and design strategies that help to reduce these casualties. Procedures for full-scale vehicle crash testing of guard rails were first published in the US in 1962. Present European regulation is mainly based on these procedures and later developments. Since then the vehicle fleet has changed considerably. Due to the complexity of the actual safety problem the numerical simulation approach offers a good opportunity to evaluate the different parameters involved in road safety, such as infrastructure properties, vehicle type, vehicle occupants and injuries. The ideal situation would be that simulation tools are coupled or integrated and all involved effects would be related. At the moment this is not the case yet, but initiatives are taken and a new virtual era has started. This paper offers a method looking at two components that encompass the driving environment: the car and the guardrail. As part of the EC-funded project, RISER (Roadside Infrastructure for Safer European Roads) a multi body simulation program study is carried out to determine sensitivities of some parameters in car to guardrail collisions and gives insides in performance of the car with passive safety equipment, the guardrail and the interaction of these objects with each other. By offering a set of methods that includes these two aspects and their intertwining relations, more confidence can be gained in actually reducing fatalities due to single vehicle collisions with, or due to, roadside furniture. Reducing the number of fatalities of single vehicle crashes would contribute greatly to the stated goal of reducing casualties altogether.
Since the compulsory use of child restraints for children up to 5 years of age was introduced in 2000, restraint use among younger children has increased significantly. However, the observed rate of child restraint use plateaus at around 50%, and apparently little spillover effect has been found for older children who are not covered by the law. This report examines the restraint use patterns for children who were injured in cars in relation to driver and child passenger characteristics. Univariate and multivariate analyses were conducted to describe the association between the outcome measure (the proper use of restraints for children) and relevant variables. Better ways for parents and caregivers to improve the use of restraints for children are also discussed.
The incidence and treatment of sternal fractures among traffic accidents are of increasing importance to ensure best possible outcomes. Analysis of technical indicators of the collision, preclinical and clinical data of patients with sterna fractures from 1985-2004 among 42,055 injured patients were assessed by an Accident Research Unit. Two time groups were categorized: 1985-1994 (A) vs. 1995-2004 (B). 267/42,055 patients (0.64%) suffered a sterna fracture. Regarding the vehicle type, the majority occurred after car accidents in 0.81% (251/31,183 pts), followed by 0.19% (5/2,633pts) driving motorbike, and 0.11% (4/3,258pts) driving a truck. 91% wore a safety belt. Only 13% of all passengers suffering a sternal fracture had an airbag on board (33/255 car/trucks), with an airbag malfunction in 18%. The steering column was deformed in 39%, the steering wheel in 36%. Cars in the recent years were significantly older (7.67-±5 years (B) vs. 5.88-±5 years (A), p=0.003). Cervical spine injuries are frequent (23% vs. 22%), followed by multiple rib fractures (14% vs. 12%) and lung injuries (12% vs. 11%). We found 9/146 (6%) and 3/121 patients (3%) with heart contusion among the 267 sternal fractures. MAIS was 2.56-±1.3 vs. 2.62-±1.3 (A vs. B, p=0.349). 18% of patients were polytraumatized, with 11.2% dying at the scene, 2.3% in the hospital. Sternal fractures occur most often in old cars to seat-belted drivers often without any airbag. Severe multiple rib fractures and lung contusion are concomitant injuries in more than 10% each indicating the severity of the crash. Over a twentyyear period, the injury severity encountered was not different with 18% polytrauma patients suffering sternal fractures.
Due to recent years accident avoidance and crashworthiness on Austrian roads were mostly developed on national statistics and on-scene investigation respectively. Identification and elimination of black spots were main targets. In fact many fatal accidents do not occur on such black spots and black-spot investigation has reached a limit. New methods are required and therefore the Austrian Road Safety Programme was introduced by the Austrian Ministry of Transport, Innovation and Technology. The primary objective is the reduction of fatalities and severe injuries. Graz University of Technology initiated the project ZEDATU (Zentrale Datenbank tödlicher Unfälle) with the goal to identify similarities in different accident configurations. A matrix was established which categorizes risk and key factors of participating parties. Based on this information countermeasures were worked out.
NASS: the glass is half full
(2007)
The National Accident Sampling System (NASS) was born in the late 1970s. It was based on a substantial amount of experience and analysis of what was needed in the United States to understand the safety challenges of our highways. This work also showed how to collect high quality and useful crash data efficiently. Unfortunately, when Ronald Reagan - a President who believed in limited government - was elected, any hope of full funding for NASS was lost. The concept of 75 teams investigating about 18,000 serious crashes in detail annually was never realized. The system got up to 50 teams, then was cut to 36, and finally to 24 teams investigating fewer than a quarter of the originally anticipated number of crashes per year. Despite this, the NASS investigations provide a rich source of data, collected according to a sophisticated statistical sampling system to facilitate detailed national estimates of road casualties on our nation- highways and their causes. In addition, changes have been made in recent years to increase the number of more serious crashes of recent model vehicles to make the results more relevant to improving vehicle safety. A recent, detailed examination of hundreds of rollovers has provided considerable insight into rollover casualties and into what can be done to reduce them. Some of these results will be presented that show the value of the NASS system. Our experience with NASS and the Fatal Accident Reporting System (FARS) suggests a number of improvements that could be made in the United States" crash data systems. It also provides justification for a doubling or tripling of our national expenditures on crash data collection.
The increase in light duty trucks (LDT) on the road in the US is a safety concern because of their aggressivity, or risk they present to occupants of cars, especially in side impacts. We use FARS data to look at fatality trends in frontal and side impacts between cars and LDT. FARS data is also used to determine risk, or fatalities per registered vehicle, imposed on car drivers from other vehicle types. We use NASS CDS data to investigate sources of serious injuries in vehicles with side impact. These sources of injury are categorized into three major groups: 1) contact without intrusion, 2) contact with intrusion, and 3) restraints. We find a greater fraction of intrusion related injuries in cars struck on their side by SUV or pick-up trucks than when they are struck by other cars.
This study examines the severity and types of injuries sustained by child pedestrians aged 18 years and below in order to identify the body regions at greatest risk for injury in a pedestrian accident. Detailed medical diagnoses were reviewed retrospectively for 572 child pedestrians admitted to an urban pediatric trauma center with injuries during the time period from January 2001 to December 2005. Eighty percent of these children sustained AIS 2 or greater injuries, most commonly to the lower extremity (41%) and head (34%). Fortyfour percent of admitted children had more significant AIS 3 or greater injuries primarily to the head (58%), thorax (17%) and lower extremities (14%). Testing procedures to assess the child- interaction with the motor vehicle should include injury assessment for the pediatric head, thorax and lower extremities. This understanding of how child pedestrians interact with motor vehicles may provide insight into effective countermeasures with potential for implementation in vehicle designs world-wide.
The number of injuries sustained by car occupants involving the head, thorax, spine, pelvis and the upper limbs have been reduced significantly during recent years. This is probably due to better safety features in the cars, especially the availability and usage of safety belts, airbags etc. Therefore one can notice clinically a relative increase in survivors of severe frontal crashes, but many of them have injuries to the lower extremities. To verify this, we analyzed the foot and ankle injuries of front seat passengers.
In Finland all fatal motor vehicle accidents are studied in-depth on-the-spot by multidisciplinary (police, road and vehicle engineers, physician and behavioural scientist) road accident investigation teams (legislation 2001, work started 1968), which operate in every province. The purpose of the teams is to uncover risk factors that turned an ordinary driving situation into a serious accident and give safety recommendations for improving road safety. The investigation teams do not take a stand on guilt or insurance compensation. When analysing accidents the teams use the concepts of key event, immediate, background and injury risk factors. Compiled investigation folders of each case contain investigation forms from each member, preinvestigation protocol, photographs, sketches etc. About 500 items of information are collected from each accident party. The collected information is also coded into a computer database. Both the database and the investigation folders are widely utilized by researchers and authorities conducting safety work.
This study aimed to identify the occurrence, type and mechanisms of the traumatic injuries of the vulnerable road users in vehicle collisions, and to determine the effects of human, engineering, and environment factors on traffic accidents and injuries. The pedestrian accident cases were collected in the years 2000 to 2005 from Changsha Wujing hospital China and Accident Research Unit at Medical University Hannover in Germany. A statistic analysis was carried out using the collected accident data. The results from analysis of Changsha data were compared with results from analysis of GIDAS data Hannover. The injury severities were determined using AIS code and ISS values. The results were presented in terms of cause of injuries, injury distributions, injury patterns, injury severity. The factors influenced the injury outcomes were proposed and discussed for the vehicle transport environment and road users. The results were discussed with regard to accident data collection, accident sampling and injury distributions etc. In the urban area of Changsha, motorcycles and passenger cars are most frequently involved in vehicle pedestrian accidents. Head and lower extremities injuries are the predominant types of pedestrian injuries. The pedestrian accidents were identified as vital issue in urban traffic safety and therefore a high priority should be given to this road user group in research of safe urban transportation. In Hannover area, cars are most frequently involved in traffic accidents, injured pedestrians are involved in road traffic of Germany in 13% of all causalities only in 2005 and have nearly the same number as motorcyclists, but the half of bicyclists.
The objective of this study was to identify aspects of the individual experience and behaviour of drivers in intersection accidents. A total of 40 accident drivers sketched their ideas and expectations relating to intersection assistance using the method of Structure Formation Technique. Using this method prepared content cards and relation cards for a subject matter are formed together in a structure through the application of an explicit set of rules. The structures generated in this process were compared with the structures of 20 control persons who have not recently experienced an accident at intersections. The basis for this comparison was a case-control design with matched samples regarding the variables age, sex, education, occupation, driving experience and annual mileage. The results of the accident reports indicate that additional assistance is instrumental in the perception of other road users. Generally the interviewed drivers were open-minded towards the use of intersection assistance systems. Drivers who have recently experienced an accident at intersections significantly more often approved of warning assistance in their vehicle than drivers who have not recently experienced an accident. Further accident experienced drivers favoured warning and information via audio warning more frequently. The ideas of the drivers were strongly shaped by the experiences with already available advanced driver assistance systems. Hence acoustic and visual warnings were generally preferred to tactile warnings. The findings also indicate a relationship between the variable age and the acceptance of automatic vehicle intervention, and the suggestion of a head up display as a configuration of a visual warning system.
This study updates previous IIHS studies comparing estimated delta Vs for crash tested vehicles to the distribution of estimated delta Vs in the National Automotive Sampling System (NASS) Crashworthiness Data System (CDS). The delta V estimates for 232 frontal crash tests at 64.4km/h into a deformable barrier with 40 percent overlap are compared with estimates from frontal offset crashes in the 1997-2004 NASS database. All delta V estimates were based on SMASH, the delta V estimating program used by NASS since 1997. Results indicated that for all vehicles tested by IIHS, SMASH delta Vs were, on average, 32 percent lower than impact speeds and about 28 percent lower than the expected delta V. Almost 80 percent of all real-world frontal crashes resulting in AIS 3+ injuries and just over 60 percent of all fatal crashes occur at or below the average estimated delta V calculated for crash tested vehicles.
In the context of this study, different data sources for accident research were examined regarding their possible data access and evaluated concerning the individual quality and extent of the data. Analyses of accidents require detailed and comprehensive information in particular concerning vehicle damages, injury patterns and descriptions of the accident sequence. The police documentation supplies the basic accident statistics and is amended in the context of the forensic treatment by further information, e.g. by medical and technical appraisals and witness questionings. As a new approach to the data acquisition for the analysis of fatal traffic accidents, the information was made usable which was collected by the police and by the investigations of the public prosecutor. The best strategy for obtaining reliable, extensive and complete data consists of combining the information from these two sources: the very complete, but elementary statistic data of the Niedersächsisches Landesamt für Statistik (Lower Saxony State Authority of Statistics), based on the police documentation as well as the very extensive accident information resulting from the investigation documentation of the public prosecutor after conclusion of the procedure, the so-called Court Records. Of all 715 fatal traffic accidents, which happened in the year 2003 in the German State of Lower Saxony, 238 cases were selected by means of a statistically coincidental selective procedure based on a statistically representative manner (every third accident). These cases cover the investigation documents of the 11 responsible public prosecutor- offices, which were requested and evaluated while preserving the data security. Of the 238 cases 202 cases were available, which were individually coded and stored in a data base using 160 variables. Thus a data base of a sample of representative data for fatal accidents in Lower Saxony was set up. The data base contains extensive information concerning general accident data (35 variables), concerning road and road surface data (30 variables), concerning vehicle-specific data (68 variables) as well as concerning personal and injury data (27 variables).
The primary goal of this investigation was to determine the relative risk of traffic accidents in students. In a two year period, a survey amongst 2,325 students was carried out, and 3,645 injuries sustained by students treated at our hospital were analyzed. Moped-riding in adolescents were associated with a 23.75-fold increased risk for injury as compared to biking. Children who ride bicycles have a 2.2-fold increased risk for an injury sustained by traffic accidents compared to pedestrians. None of 50 injured bicycle riders with helmet had an AIS for head injuries of more than 2. 24 of 233 injured bicycle drivers without helmet had an AIS for head injuries of more than 2. The use of a protective helmet significantly reduced the severity of head injuries. The level of awareness towards danger and a history of previous accidents correlate with the likelihood of future accidents. Due to the severity of traffic accidents, more adequate prevention measures (wearing of bicycle helmets and better education for moped riders) are urgently needed.
The price of a new car increased almost every year for a long period. In recent years however, the budget available to most people for purchasing a car either did not grow or became even smaller. Therefore it was in the interest of some OEMs to offer economical car models in the so-called "8,000- Euro class". Here an important question arose regarding the safety of these vehicles. There is no question that the very high safety level of cars reached in Europe during the last decades should not be sacrificed as a consequence of smaller budgets. Customers with sense of responsibility have the right to be properly informed about the balance between safety and price so that they can make a deliberate decision when buying either a new or a used car. Against this background, the German magazine "AutoBILD" commissioned DEKRA to conduct fullscale frontal crash tests with a view to publishing the results. These tests have been carried out in accordance with the corresponding Euro NCAP crash test requirements and performance criteria. The tested vehicles were two new Logans produced by the manufacturer Dacia, two used cars of the type VW Golf IV (registration date 2000) and one new VW Fox. This paper describes the safety features of the vehicles and the results of the five crash tests to demonstrate state-of-the-art safety levels and what levels may be expected from vehicles in the "8,000- Euro class". Looking at real-world crashes it is of interest to think about future trends in a more detailed manner. Therefore it will be more and more necessary to supplement the federal statistics with more detailed in-depth information about the consequences of accidents and the safety performance of crashed vehicles.
In recent years the boundaries between active and passive safety blurred more and more. Passive safety in the traditional term includes all safety aspects to prevent occupants to be injured or at least injury severity should be reduced. Passive Safety starts with the collision (first vehicle contact) and ends with rescue (open vehicle doors). Within this phase the occupant has to be protected by the passenger compartment whereby no intrusion should occur. Active safety on the other side was developed to interact prior to the collision whereby the goal is to prevent accidents. The extensive interaction between active and passive safety led to the terminologies "Primary" and "Secondary" safety whereas the expression Integrated Safety Concept was generated. Within this study the most well documented single vehicle accidents with cars not equipped with ESP were identified from the PENDANT database and reconstructed. Additional cases were found in the database ZEDATU of TU Graz. In comparison each case was simulated with the assumption that the cars were equipped with ESP. The differences regarding accident avoidance or crash severity as well as reduction of injury risk were analysed.
This paper uses the national accident statistics of Great Britain to evaluate the effectiveness of Electronic Stability Control Systems (ESC) to reduce crash involvement rates. The crash experience of 8,951 cars is analysed and compared to a closely matching set of non-ESC cars using case-control methods. This is one of the largest ESC samples analysed to date. Overall the cars with ESC are involved in 3% fewer crashes although the effectiveness is substantially higher under conditions of adverse road friction. ESC equipped cars are involved in 15% fewer fatal crashes although this reduction represents the combined effect of ESC and passive safety improvements.
There is a need for detecting characteristics of pedestrian movement before car-pedestrian collisions to trigger a fully reversible pedestrian protection system. For this purpose, a pedestrian sensor system has been developed. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the sensor system, the in-depth knowledge of car-pedestrian impact scenarios is needed. This study aims at the evaluation of the sensor system. The accident data are selected from the STRADA database. The accident scenarios available in this database were evaluated and the knowledge of the most common scenarios was developed in terms of the pedestrian trajectory, the pedestrian speed, the car trajectory, the car velocity, etc. A mathematical model was then established to evaluate the sensor system with different detective angles. It was found that in order to detect all the pedestrians in the most common scenarios on time the sensor detective angle must be kept larger than 60 degrees.
The accident research project in Dresden was founded in July 1999. To date over 6.000 crash investigations have been undertaken. About 10.000 vehicles have been documented and over 13.000 participants have been debriefed. But there is much more than this scientific success. Because of the interdisciplinary character between the medical and technical focus, the project affords an important contribution for the education of the involved students. Over 200 students of different fields of study have got experiences not only for the occupational career. This lecture describes the additional effects of the accident research project regarding the education of the students, the capacity for teamwork and learning about dealing with accident casualties.