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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.
Although the bus belongs to the safest traffic means, single accidents can be particularly severe and concern many passengers. Especially in case of fires a high number of injured and killed persons can be the outcome. Fire safety of buses therefore is of high importance. With the increase of plastic materials as a material for the interior equipment of buses and coaches due to their good mechanical properties combined with low weight, the question arises whether the safety level has decreased in case of a fire during the last years " also compared to other means of transport. Because of the combustible plastics and their ability to release a high amount of heat the main fire load in buses is no longer the fuel but the plastic materials which are also often easy to ignite. Besides the flammability of the equipments, also the production of smoke, the smoke development and propagation as well as its toxicity are of interest. That counts for the passengers as well as for the test methods and its limit values. The severe fire in Germany near Hanover in 2008 with 20 fatalities showed how disastrous such fires can be. For those reasons several research projects were initiated on behalf of the German Federal Highway Research Institute. At the one hand the fire behaviour of coach interiors was examined in general focusing on fire propagation as well as fire detection and signalling. As result, recommendations with regard to early fire detection systems for the engine compartments and onboard extinguishing equipment were elaborated. On the other hand research was carried out to examine heat release, smoke, smoke propagation and its toxicity due to burning bus interior materials. In this project small and real scale experiments on material specimens, interior parts and vehicles were performed. Trains and buses often have very similar operation conditions. Consequently, bus interior material was tested according to the regulations for rail vehicles, i.e. DIN EN 45545 as well as DIN 5510. None of the tested bus interior materials would have been allowed to use in a train. The fire safety regulations for bus materials are on a low level compared to other transport sectors, i.e. railway, ship and aircraft. Also numerical investigations with the Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) were performed. The very rapid fire development during the severe bus fire from 2008 could be predicted with the numerical model. The model was then used to investigate the influence of different materials, ventilation conditions and ignition sources. The bus materials contribute significantly to a very rapid fire development in bus fires. Especially, the flammable ceiling and the passenger seats were identified to be key issues of the fire propagation in a bus and can be explained by the rapid fire spread along the ceiling and the high fire load of passenger seats. As conclusion of the project effective and economically reasonable fire safety requirements for interiors of buses are recommended which would improve the current situation. Proposals for amendments of current requirements are recommended including the specification of appropriate limit values. In particular, it is taken into consideration which reasonable fire safety standards from other transport sectors, especially the rail sector, should be transferred to buses
In road traffic accidents, a car-seat and its occupant can be subjected to various crash pulses in the case of a rear impact. This study investigates the influence of crash pulse shape on seat-occupant response and evaluates the corresponding risk of whiplash injury. For this purpose, a rigorously validated seat-occupant system model is used to study different carseat designs and crash pulses. Two different car-seat concepts are also presented which can effectively mitigate whiplash injury for a wide range of crash severity. It is shown that for crash pulses of similar severity, the level of whiplash-risk depends strongly on the combined effects of seat design and crash pulse shape.
In most of developed countries, the progress made in passive safety during the last three decades allowed to drastically reduce the number of killed and severely injured especially for occupants of passenger cars. This reduction is mainly observed for frontal impacts for which the AIS3+ injuries has been reduced about 52% for drivers and 38% for front passengers. The stiffening of the cars' structure coupled with the generalization of airbags and the improvement of the seatbelt restraint (load limiter, pretension, etc.) allowed to protect vital body regions such as head, neck and thorax. However, the abdomen did not take advantage with so much success of this progress. The objective of this study is to draw up an inventory on the abdominal injuries of the belted car occupants involved in frontal impact, to present adapted counter-measures and to assess their potential effectiveness. In the first part the stakes corresponding to the abdominal injuries will be defined according to types of impact, seat location, occupants' age and type of injured organs. Then, we shall focus on the abdominal injury risk curves for adults involved in frontal impact and on the comparisons of the average risks according to the seat location. In the second part we will list counter-measures and we shall calculate their effectiveness. The method of case control will be used in order to estimate odds ratio, comparing two samples, given by occupants having or not having the studied safety system. For this study, two type of data sources are used: national road injured accident census and retrospective in-depth accident data collection. Abdominal injuries are mainly observed in frontal impact (52%). Fatal or severe abdominal occupant- injuries are observed at least in 27% of cases, ranking this body region as the most injured just after the thorax (51%). In spite of a twice lower occupation rate in the back seats compared to the front seats, the number of persons sustaining abdominal injuries at the rear place is higher than in the front place. In recent cars, the risk of having a serious or fatal abdominal injury in a frontal impact is 1.6% for the driver, 3.6% for the front passenger and 6.3% for the rear occupants. The most frequently hurt organs are the small intestine (17%), the spleen (16%) and the liver (13%). The most common countermeasures have a good efficiency in the reduction of the abdominal injuries for the adults: the stiffness of the structure of the seats allows decreasing the abdominal injury risk from 54% (driver) to 60% (front occupant), the seatbelt pretensioners decrease also this risk from 90% (driver) to 83% (front passenger).
Rollovers continue to be a major source of heavy truck fatalities when compared to other accident modes. Real world rollover accidents are analyzed and two distinct damage patterns are identified. Damage to heavy truck roofs can occur from lateral loading that transitions to vertical roof loading as the vehicle rolls onto its side and then over onto its roof. A second load path can occur when the vehicle has rolled onto its side and furrows into the ground generating large longitudinal friction forces between the roof and ground. A review of the previous literature and various test methodologies are presented. A sled impact test methodology is presented which allows for structural assessment of a heavy truck cab's crashworthiness in both of these loading environments. Two test series are presented using the sled impact test methodology in order to analyze real world truck rollovers using varying impact platen and contact angles. The structural deformation and failure patterns were found to be consistent with damage seen in real world accident vehicles. In each case, a second equivalent truck cab was then reinforced and tested under similar conditions to evaluate the energy management and crush resistance of a stronger cab structure. These structural reinforcements demonstrated a substantial reduction in roof crush and protected the survival space of the occupant compartment. The sled impact test procedure is an effective method for testing the structural performance of a heavy truck cab in a variety of loading scenarios comparable to real world accidents and ascertaining the load and energy load levels in these accident modes.
Data concerning accidents involving personal injury which have been collected in the context of in-depth investigations on scene in the Hannover area since 1973 and in the Dresden area since 1999 represent an important basis for empirical traffic safety research. At national and international level various analyses and comparisons are carried out on the basis of "in-depth data" from the above mentioned investigations. In-depth data play a decisive role e.g. within the validation of EuroNCAP results on secondary safety (crashworthiness) of individual passenger car models. Thus, statistically sound methods of data analysis and population parameter estimation are of high importance. Since the 1st of August 1984 the "in-depth investigations on scene" in the Hannover area have been carried out according to a sampling plan developed by HAUTZINGER in the context of a research project on behalf of BASt. In the meantime a second region of in-depth investigation on scene was added with surveys in Dresden and the surrounding area. Internationally, the acronym GIDAS (German In-Depth Accident Study) is commonly used for the two above mentioned surveys. The objective of a current research project (topic of this contribution) is, among other things, to examine and adjust the previous weighting and expansion method for the two regional accident investigations to the current general conditions.
Empirical vehicle crashworthiness studies are usually based on national or in-depth traffic accident surveys: Data on accident-involved cars/drivers are analysed in order to quantify the chance of driver injury and to assess certain risk factors like car make and model. As the cars/drivers involved in the same accident form a "cluster", where the size of the cluster equals the number of accident-involved parties, traffic accident survey data are typical multi-level data with accidents as first-level or primary and cars/drivers as secondlevel or secondary units (car occupants in general are to be considered as third level units). Consequently, appropriate statistical multi-level models are to be used for driver injury risk estimation purposes as these models properly account for the cluster structure of traffic accident survey data. In recent years various types of regression models for clustered data have been developed in the statistical sciences. This paper presents multi-level statistical models, which are generally applicable for vehicle crashworthiness assessment in the sense that data on single and multiple car crashes can be analysed simultaneously. As a special case of multi-level modelling driver injury risk estimation based on paired-by-collision car/driver data is considered. It is demonstrated that assessment results may be seriously biased, if the cluster structure inherent in traffic accident survey data is erroneously ignored in the data analysis stage.
Crash involvement studies using routine accident and exposure data : a case for case-control designs
(2009)
Fortunately, accident involvement is a rare event: the chance of an individual road user trip to end up in a crash is close to zero. Thus, according to general epidemiological principles one can expect the case-control study design to be especially suitable for quantifying the relative risk (odds ratio) of accident involvement of road users with a certain risk factor as compared to road users that do not have this characteristic. Ideally, of course, the database for such a case-control study should be established by drawing two independent random samples of cases (accidental units) and controls (nonaccidental units), respectively. If, however, special data collection is not an option, it is nevertheless possible to analyze routine accident and exposure data under a case-control design in order to fully exploit the information contained in already existing databases. As a prerequisite, accident and exposure data from different sources are to be combined in a single file of micro or grouped data in a way consistent with the case-control study design. Among other things, the proposed methodological approach offers the possibility to use in-depth data of the GIDAS type also in investigations of active vehicle safety by combining this data with appropriate vehicle trip data collected in mobility surveys.
The so-called "seat-belt injuries" or "seat-belt syndromes", described as 2-point seat-belt injuries, contain heavy inflection injuries of the lumbal spinal column, combined with heavy abdominal injuries as rupture of the upper intestinal bold or heavy injuries of the upper entrails. With "playing" children in the font of the car, with inappropriate plant of 3-point belts, identical injuries can occur.
This study analyses no.39 cases in which n.41 motorcyclists were fatally injured, or 36% of total motorcycle fatalities in Northern Ireland between 2004 and 2010 (n.114). There were n.17 cases (43.6%) where the actions of another vehicle driver caused the collision, in thirteen of these cases the motorcycles had their lights switched on. The remaining n.22 collisions (56.4%) were due to the actions of the motorcyclist. In the approach to the collision scene, there were n.13 cases (31.7%) in which the approach was a right hand bend and in n.8 (19.5%) cases, the approach was a left hand bend. In the remaining n.18 (43.9%) cases, the approach was a straight road. Of the n.17 (41.4%) motorcycles that slid after falling, n.10 (24.4%) fell onto their right side and the remaining n.7 (17.1%) fell onto their left side. The information from this study identifies primary and contributory causes of motorcycle collisions.
The changed focus in vehicle safety technology from secondary to primary safety systems need to evolve new methods to investigate accidents, high critical, critical and normal driving situations. Current Naturalistic Driving Studies mostly use vehicles that are highly equipped with additional measuring devices, video cameras, recording technology, and sensors. These equipped fleets are very expensive regarding the setup and administration of the study. Due to the great rarity of crashes it is additionally necessary to have a high distribution and a homogeneous distribution of subject groups. At the end all these facts are leading to a very expensive study with a manageable number of data. Smartphones are becoming more and more popular not only for younger people. Contrary to traditional mobile phones they are mostly equipped with sensors for acceleration and yaw rates, GPS modules as well as cameras in high definition resolution. Additionally they have high-performance processors that enable the execution of CPU-intensive tools directly on the phone. The wide distribution of these smartphones enables researchers to get high numbers of users for such studies. The paper shows and demonstrates a software app for smartphones that is able to record different driving situations up to crashes. Therefore all relevant parameter from the sensors, camera and GPS device are saved for a given duration if the event was triggered. The complete configuration is independently adjustable to the relevant driver and all events were sent automatically to the research institute for a further process. Direct after the event, interviews with the driver can be done and important data regarding the event itself are documented. The presentation shows the methodology and gives a demonstration of the working progress as well as first results and examples of the current study. In the discussion the advantages of this method will be discussed and compared with the disadvantages. The paper shows an alternative method to investigate real accident and incident data. This method is thereby highly cost efficient and comparable with existing methods for benefit estimation.
The number of injured car occupants decreases constantly. Nevertheless, they account for nearly 50% of all fatalities and about 44% of all seriously injured persons in German traffic accidents. Further reductions of casualties require multiple efforts in all parts of traffic safety. In this paper a detailed analysis of the important pre-hospital rescue phase was done. The basis for future improvements is the knowledge about injury causation of car occupants in combination with other corresponding influence factors. For that reason more than 1.200 severe (AIS3+) injuries of frontal car occupants were analyzed. For the most relevant injuries of car occupants multivariate analysis models were created to predict the probability of these injuries in a real crash scenario. In addition to the collision severity different influence factors like impact direction, seat belt usage, age of the occupant, and gender were analyzed. Furthermore, the models were checked regarding the goodness of fit and all results all results were checked concerning their robustness. The prediction models were created on the basis of 5.000 car accidents. Afterwards, the models were validated using 4.000 different car accidents. The prediction of the probability of severe injuries could be used for different applications in the field of traffic safety. One possibility is the implementation of the models in a tool for the on-the-spot diagnosis. The background for the development of such applications is the fact, that there are only limited diagnostic possibilities available at the accident scene. Nevertheless, the rescue forces have to make essential decisions like the alerting of the necessary medical experts, appropriate treatment, the type of transportation and the choice of an adequate hospital. These decisions quite often decide between life and death or influence the long-term effects of injured persons. At this point, indications of expectable injuries could help enormously. To enable even persons with limited technical knowledge to use the tool, a procedure was developed that facilitates the assumption of the given crash severity. Another important possibility for the application of the prediction models is the use for the qualification of information sent by e-call systems.
Over the last decades the number of traffic accident fatalities on German roads decreased by 77% down to 4968 in the year 2007. This positive development is due to optimisations of vehicle safety, roads and infrastructure and medical rescue issues. Up to now mostly the optimisations of secondary safety measures lead to this effect on vehicle safety. Since some years more and more driver assistance systems are available and lead to a further reduction of all accidents. These new systems are often comfort systems and have not primarily been developed to increase vehicle safety. In contrast to secondary safety systems primary safety systems are able to mitigate and avoid accidents. So in the future it is important to estimate the benefit of these systems in reducing accident numbers as well. Current benefit estimation methods mostly focus on a single system only and not on the combination of systems. In this paper a new method for a multivariate benefit estimation based on real accident data is developed. The paper describes the basic method to estimate the benefit of primary and secondary safety systems in combination. With the presented method the benefit will not be overestimated as it would be by a simple addition of the benefits of single systems. The model will be validated by a multivariate prospective benefit estimation of different vehicle safety systems in comparison to single benefit estimations of the same systems. For this the German In-Depth Accident Database is used. The results show the importance to implement the interactions of safety systems in the estimation process and rate the overestimation by a simple addition of the single system benefits. The validation includes primary and secondary safety systems in combination. The validation is done using more than 3500 real accidents which were initiated by cars. This sample out of the GIDAS database is representative for the current accident situation in Germany. The paper shows the necessity of a multivariate estimation of the benefit for existing and future safety systems.
In the last years various new driver information and driver assistance systems made their way into modern vehicles and there are yet countless systems underway. However, expenses for both, the development and the construction of these systems are tremendous. Therefore the interest of evaluating systems keeps growing steadily, not only regarding the results of systems developed in the last years but also regarding system ideas. Only if at least a rough benefit estimation is given, the industry can decide which development should be supported. However, there is still a lack of transparency of possible and useful methods for these kinds of estimations. These were analyses and structured in this study.
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.
Because of actual developments and the continuous increase in the field of drive assistant systems, representative and detailed investigations of accident databases are necessary. This lecture describes the possibility to estimate the potential of primary and secondary safety measures by means of a computerized case by case analysis. Single primary or secondary safety measures as well as a combination of both are presented. The method is exemplarily shown for the primary safety measure "Brake Assist" in pedestrian accidents. Regarding accident prevention only the primary safety measure is determined.
Accident simulation and reconstruction for enhancing pedestrian safety: issues and challenges
(2015)
The enhancement of pedestrian safety represents a major challenge in traffic accidents. This study allows a better understanding of the issues in pedestrian protection. It highlights the potential of in-depth studies in identifying relevant crash parameters interfering in the pedestrian safety. A computational simulation tool was developed to reconstruct pedestrian real-world crashes. A sample of 100 in-depth accident cases was reconstructed from two sources: 40 crashes provided by IFSTTAR-LMA and 60 crashes from CASR. To exemplify the methodology, two accident cases from each database were illustrated. A description of the sample of crashes was presented including the travel and impact speed of the vehicle, the driver reaction, the pedestrian walking speed, the scene configuration with the eventual obstacles, etc. This detailed description is pointing to the major factors affecting the limits of pedestrian safety systems.
Cycling supports the independence and health of the aging population. However, elderly cyclists have an increased injury risk. The majority of injured cyclists is victim of a single-sided accident, an accident in which there is no other party involved. The aim of the project "Safe and Aware on the bicycle" is to develop guidelines for an advisory system that is useful in preventing single-sided accidents. This system is able to support the elderly cyclist; enabling the cyclist to timely adapt his cycling behaviour and improve cycling safety and comfort. For the development of such advisory system the causes of singles accidents and the wishes of the elderly cyclist must be known. First step to obtain this insight was a literature survey and an GIDAS research. Unfortunately accidentology research with GIDAS did not give the full understanding of the pre-crash situations and (especially the behaviour related) factors leading to the accident. The second step was consultation of elderly cyclist through a questionnaire (n=800), in-depth interviews (n=12) and focus group sessions (n=15). This offered complementary information and a much better understanding of the behavioural aspects. Results concern the behaviour in traffic and identify specific physical (i.e. problems looking backwards over the shoulder) and mental issues. Furthermore, the needs and wishes for support in specific cycling situations were identified. In conclusion; The GIDAS results together with the information obtained contacting the elderly cyclists enabled setting up requirements for an advisory system, which is useful in preventing single-sided accidents.
Novice drivers are at high risk for crash involvement. We performed an analysis of causations, injury patterns and distributions of novice drivers in cars and on motorcycles in road traffic as a basis for proper measurements. Method Data of accident and hospital records of novice drivers (licence < 2 years) were analysed focusing the following parameters: injury type, localisation and mechanism, Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS), maximum AIS (MAIS), delta-v, collision speed and other technical parameters and have been compared to those of experienced drivers. In 18352 accidents in the area of Hannover (years1985"2004), 2602 novice drivers and 18214 experienced drivers were recorded having an accident. Novice car drivers were more often and severe injured than experienced and on motorcycles the experienced riders were at higher risk. Novice drivers of both groups sustained more often extremity injuries. 4.5 % novice car drivers were not restraint compared to 3.7 % of the experienced drivers and 6.1 % novice motorcycle drivers did not wear a proper helmet (versus 6.5 %). Severe injuries sustained at a rate of 20 % at collision speeds below 30 km/h and in 80% at collision speeds above 50 km/h. Novice car drivers drove significant older cars. The risk profile of novice drivers is similar to those of drivers older than 65 years. Structural protection and special lectures like skidding courses could be proper remedial action next to harder punishment of violations.
Description of road traffic related knee injuries in published investigations is very heterogeneous. The purpose of this study was to estimate the risk of knee injuries in real world car impacts in Germany focusing vulnerable road users (pedestrians, bicyclists and motorcyclists) and restrained car drivers. The accident research unit analyses technical and medical data collected shortly after the accident at scene. Two different periods (years 1985-1993 and 1995-2003) were compared focusing on knee injuries (Abbreviated Injury Scale (AISKnee) 2/3). In order to determine the influences type of collision, direction and speed as well as the injury pattern and different injury scores (AIS, MAIS, ISS) were examined. 1.794 pedestrians, 742 motorcyclists, 2.728 bicyclists and 1.116 car drivers were extracted. 2% had serious ligamentous or bony injuries in relation to all injured. The risk of injury is higher for twowheelers than for pedestrians, but knee injury severity is higher for the latter group. Overall the current knee injury risk is low and significant reduced comparing both time periods (27%, p<0,0001). Severe injuries (AISKnee 2/3) were below 1%). Improved aerodynamic design of car fronts reduced the risk for severe knee injuries significantly (p=0,0015). Highest risk of injury is for motorcycle followed by pedestrians, respectively. Knee protectors could prevent injuries by reducing local forces. The classically described dashboard injury was rarely identified. The overall injury risk for knee injuries in road traffic is lower than estimated and reduced comparing both periods. The aerodynamic shape of current cars compared to older types reduced the incidence and severity of knee injuries. Further modification and optimization of the interior and exterior design could be a proper measurement. Classic described injury mechanisms were rarely identified. It seems that the AIS is still underestimating extremity injuries and their long term results.
The European CASPER (Child Advanced Safety Project for European Roads) project studying car child safety includes a sociological approach in order to have a better understanding of the behaviour of parents driving children under 12 years old. A questionnaire was distributed via the internet in Europe with 998 parents (representing 1638 children) from 22 European countries responding. The results inform on the way parents secure their children during a car trip. Many parents did not control how their children were installed in the child restraint system (CRS). A toddler was more likely to travel into a child seat than an older child was. Regarding misuse situations, an important part of the participants did not think that they could make mistakes when fixing the child seat to the car (26%) or when placing the child into the seat (39%). This leaves an important field of action especially by communication via different media and in the CRS sale outlets.
Rollover scenarios in Europe
(2005)
Rollover accidents seem to be a rising problem in Europe and therefore the systematic of this accident scenario should be investigated. Based on statistical investigations on major European accident databases for different countries a series of 73 real world rollover accidents was analysed. These cases were reconstructed using PC-Crash and preliminary categorised using a modified USbased rollover classification. In a first step, the rollover events were reconstructed from the point of conflict to the vehicle- rest position. The vehicles kinematics as well as its linear and rotational velocities were derived. In a second step typical velocity characteristics as well as kinematics were identified and the events categorised according to these criteria. Based on these results four main categories were defined, covering all reconstructed accidents. This categorisation was based on mechanical parameters (rotatory and translator kinematical data of the vehicle). Significant differences can be seen for different scenarios for the "first phase of rollover".
The data situation for quantifying the proportion of accidents avoided by the introduction of active safety systems is incomplete, since there is generally no data available on the accidents avoided by the technology in question. In this paper, a split-register approach is suggested and compared with the classical case-control approach known from epidemiologic applications. Provided a set of assumptions hold, which can reasonably be made in such data situations, the split register approach allows inferences on the population accident risk. For both approaches the benefits of basing the analysis on the results of a logistic regression to adjust for confounding factors are outlined. The biasing effects of violating key assumptions are discussed and the split-register approach is demonstrated using the example of the active safety system ESP with data from the German in-depth accident study GIDAS.
This study that was funded by the Research Association for Automotive Technology (FAT) develops a method for the evaluation of the placement of tanks or batteries by using the deformation frequencies in real-world accidents. Therefore, the deformations of more than 20.000 passenger cars in the GIDAS database are analysed. For each vehicle a contour of deformation is calculated and the deformed areas of the vehicles are transferred in a rangy matrix of deformation. Thereby, the vehicle is divided into more than 190.000 cells. Afterwards, all single matrices of deformation are summarized for each cell which allows representative analyses of the deformation frequencies of accidents with passenger cars in Germany. On the basis of these deformation frequencies it is possible to determine least deformed areas of all passenger cars. Furthermore, intended placements of tanks or batteries can be estimated in an early stage of development. Therefore, all vehicles with deformations in the intended tank areas can be analysed individually. Considering numerous parameters out of the GIDAS database (e.g. collision speed, kind of accident, overlap, collision partner etc.) the occurring forces can be calculated or the deformation frequency can be estimated. Furthermore, it is possible to consider the influence of primary and secondary safety systems on the deformation behaviour. The analysis of "worst case accident events" is an additional application of the calculated matrix of deformation frequency.
The Swedish "Vision Zero" regards road fatalities and severe injuries as unacceptable. The vision is based on this ethical perspective together with a fundament of shared responsibility between the system designers and the road user. The design of the traffic system shall protect the road user from these effects as long as he or she follows the traffic rules. It should be possible to make a mistake without being killed. This policy has, during the first period of the "vision zero" (since 1997) put high priority on road and car design where the purpose has been to develop a forgiving environment. Gradually it has, however, become clear that much more effort has to be focused on the responsibility of the road user. Protecting measures will have limited effect as long as the understanding and acceptance from road users is limited. During the last years, Sweden has gone through several improvements of the driver education and is in the middle of important improvements of road safety education for children in schools. Several EU-projects has contributed to this development. One aspect that has received large international interest is the lay instructed driver training from 16 years of age supervised by parents. This has been in use since 1993. Another is the development of mandatory courses, such as an introduction for the learner and the lay instructor, a "risk awareness" courses dealing specifically with speeding, seat belt use, drunk driving, tiredness, and driving on low friction. The presentation will share some of the "vision zero" fundaments together with the latest experiences, research and development concerning driver education in Sweden.
India is one of the leading countries reporting highest road accidents & related injuries. TMARG (Tata Motors Accident Research Group) has been recording crashes in association with M/s. Lokamanya Medical Foundation since 2011 with M/s, Amandeep Hospitals since Aug 2013. This study has highlighted some accident types not discussed extensively in literature. Trucks to Truck impacts " Cabin interaction with overhanging loadbody structures and Offset underside impacts for passenger vehicles are seen in significant numbers. The paper discusses these in more detail including severity.
Learner drivers are readied for their participation in motorised transport within the framework of specific, internationally-diverse preparation systems. These systems are historically developed and are characterised by country-specific economic, infrastructural, legal and cultural circumstances. With the aid of functionally-distinguishable teaching and learning methods as well as testing methods, a conceptual framework was created whilst drawing upon research-methodological approaches of comparative political science as well as teaching and learning principles that facilitated a description and analysis of the systems for a comparative observation to be performed. The systems for the preparation of learner drivers in 44 countries are illustrated in the report. The descriptions are based upon surveys of experts from various institutions (ministries of transport, driving instructor associations, testing organisations) as well as upon literary and Internet research. Alongside European countries with a traditional formal driver training, \"Graduated Driver Licensing\" systems that are primarily encountered in English-speaking countries were also taken into account when selecting the countries. They are characterised by the guarantee of gaining comprehensive driving experience under reduced risk conditions in the form of supervised driving prior to the start of independent driving as well as protective special rules for learner drivers whilst gaining further driving experience during the initial phase of independent driving. The results enable a detailed insight into the country-specific structure of learner driver preparation with the components of the formal driver training in driving schools, informal teaching and learning methods such as supervised driving, the driving tests that must be successfully completed as well as legal frameworks and quality assurance measures. The functionality of system components and architectures shall be discussed against the backdrop of evaluation findings regarding the effectiveness in terms of safety.
A series of drop tests and vehicle tests with the adult head impactor according to Regulation (EC) 631/2009 and drop tests with the phantom head impactor according to UN Regulation No. 43 have been carried out by the German Federal Highway Research Institute (BASt) on behalf of the German Federal Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Development (BMVBS). Aim of the test series was to study the injury risk for vulnerable road users, especially pedestrians, in case of being impacted by a motor vehicle in a way described within the European Regulations (EC) 78/2009 and (EC) 631/2009. Furthermore, the applicability of the phantom head drop test described in UN Regulation No. 43 for plastic glazing should be investigated. In total, 30 drop tests, thereof 18 with the adult head impactor and 12 with the phantom head impactor, and 49 vehicle tests with the adult head impactor were carried out on panes of laminated safety glass (VSG), polycarbonate (PC) and laminated polycarbonate (L-PC). The influence of parameters such as the particular material properties, test point locations, fixations, ambient conditions (temperature and impact angle) was investigated in detail. In general, higher values of the Head Injury Criterion (HIC) were observed in tests on polycarbonate glazing. As the HIC is the current criterion for the assessment of head injury risk, polycarbonate glazing has to be seen as more injurious in terms of vulnerable road user protection. In addition, the significantly higher rebound of the head observed in tests with polycarbonate glazing is suspected to lead to higher neck loads and may also cause higher injury risks in secondary impacts of vulnerable road users. However, as in all tests with PC glazing no damage of the panes was observed, the risk of skin cut injuries may be expected to be reduced significantly. The performed test series give no indication for the test procedure prescribed in UN Regulation No. 43 as a methodology to approve glass windscreen not being feasible for polycarbonate glazing, as all PC panes tested fulfilled the UN R 43 requirements. The performance of the windscreen area will not be relevant for vehicle type approval according to the upcoming UN Regulation for pedestrian protection. However, it is recommended that pedestrian protection being considered for plastic windscreens to ensure at least the same level of protection as glass windscreens.
The incidence of side impacts was investigated from GIDAS data. Both vehicle-fixed object and vehicle-vehicle collisions were analysed as these are enclosed within the consumer testing program. Vehicle-fixed object collisions were stratified according to ESC availability. Results indicated that vehicles equipped with ESC rarely have pure-lateral impacts. An increase in oblique collisions was seen for the vehicles with ESC whereby most vehicle were driving in left curves. The analysis of vehicle-vehicle collisions developed injury risk curves were developed at the AIS3+ injury severity for the vehicle-vehicle side impacts. Results suggested that greatest injury risk occurred when a Pre Euro NCAP vehicle was struck by a Post Euro-NCAP vehicle. The remaining curves did not show different behaviour, indicating that stiffness increased have been equally combated. This was attributable to the few Post Euro-NCAP vehicles that had a deployed curtain airbag available in the sample. The integration of Euro NCAP testing has shown to improve vehicle crashworthiness for pole collisions, as those vehicles with ESC rarely incur lateral impacts.
Pedestrians represent about 20% of the overall fatalities in Europe- road traffic accidents. In this paper a methodology is proposed to understand why the numbers are so high, especially in the south of Europe and particularly in Portugal, . First a detailed statistical analysis using Ordinal Logistic Regression model (OLR) was applied to the gathered data from all Portuguese accidents with victims in the period 2010-2012. In a second stage accident reconstruction computational techniques using pedestrian biomechanical models are used to evaluate the accident conditions that lead to the injuries, such as the speed and the impact location. For biomechanical injury criterions, the AIS (Abbreviated Injury Scale), the HIC (Head Injury Criterion) and other injury criterions based on the resulting accelerations in the pedestrian's body are used. The statistical model reported that there were several predictors that significantly influenced the pedestrian injury severity in the event of a road accident, such as Pedestrian's age, Pedestrian's gender, Vehicle Design/Category or Driver's gender. The use of injury scales and biomechanical criterions in in-depth investigation of road accidents, such as AIS, can significantly improve the quality of the reconstruction process.
This paper set out to examine the possibilities for injury avoidance implications for older drivers in crashes, based on crash and injury patterns among older drivers and current trends in ageing in most western societies. A number of safety technologies were identified and discussed which have potential for improving vehicle older driver crash avoidance and crashworthiness. While there were some promising estimates available of the likely benefits of this technology for improving safety, it is evident that they need to be confirmed for older drivers, given their age-related disabilities and sensory limitations. Further research is urgently required to ensure that these technologies yield safety benefits without any disbenefits for older drivers.rn
Whiplash injuries are characterized by the high variability of its symptoms and by the subjectivity of its diagnosis, which sometimes leads to frauds perpetrated by victims of rear-end impacts. It is estimated that whiplash injuries cost annually about 10.000 million Euros in Europe. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the influence of the dynamics of the accident in which the victim was involved in the probability of development of whiplash associated injuries. In the presented methodology, first an accident reconstruction is performed where the dynamics of the accident is determined. This is carried out using the software PC-Crash, police and insurance companies' data. Then biomechanical injuries criteria related with whiplash injuries are evaluated. For the evaluation of the probability of having whiplash injuries, the Neck Injury Criterion (NIC) of the victim and the mean acceleration of the vehicle were evaluated. Then, with medical reports, the results of the accident reconstruction are correlated with the reported injuries. Some examples are presented. The results obtained indicate that the study of the dynamics of the road accidents in which the victims were involved could be used as an auxiliary of the prognosis of whiplash injuries and is important for a precise diagnosis of this type of injuries.
A national initiative from the vehicle manufacturers, safety system suppliers, the road administration and universities in Sweden took off in 2007. The aim was to develop a national investigation network and a methodology focusing on all phases of a crash (pre-crash, in-crash and post-crash) as well as all parts of the road transport system (road user, vehicle and road environment). The initiative is formally run as a project with the acronym INTACT (Investigation Network and Accident Collection Techniques). It was a three year pilot with the aim to develop methodologies for an extended national crash investigation activity. During the first year the INTACT partners agreed on the aim for the investigation and methods for retrieving the data were developed. During the second and third year the methodology was tested in real-world investigations and further refinement was made. The paper describes the methodology developed to obtain high qualitative in-depth road crash data.
The overall purpose of the ASSESS project is to develop a relevant and standardised set of test and assessment methods and associated tools for integrated vehicle safety systems, primarily focussing on currently available pre-crash sensing systems. The first stage of the project was to define casualty relevant accident scenarios so that the test scenarios will be developed based on accident scenarios which currently result in the greatest injury outcome, measured by a combination of casualty severity and casualty frequency. The first analysis stage was completed using data from a range of accident databases, including those which were nationally representative (STATS19, UK and STRADA, SE) and in-depth sources which provided more detailed parameters to characterise the accident scenarios (GIDAS, DE and OTS, UK). A common analysis method was developed in order to compare the data from these different sources, and while the data sets were not completely compatible, the majority of the data was aligned in such a way that allowed a useful comparison to be made. As the ASSESS project focuses on pre-crash sensing systems fitted to passenger cars, the data selected for the analysis was "injury accidents which involved at least one passenger car". The accident data analysis yielded the following ranked list of most relevant accident scenarios: Rank Accident scenario 1 Driving accident - single vehicle loss of control 2 Accidents in longitudinal traffic (same and opposite directions) 3 Accidents with turning vehicle(s) or crossing paths in junctions 4 Accidents involving pedestrians The ranked list highlights the relatively large role played by "accidents in longitudinal traffic", and "accidents with turning vehicle(s) or crossing paths in junctions" (the second and third most prevalent accident scenarios, respectively). The pre-crash systems addressed in ASSESS propose to yield beneficial safety outcomes with specific regard to these accident scenarios. This indicates that the ASSESS project is highly relevant to the current casualty crash problem. In the second stage of the analysis a selection of these accident scenarios were analysed further to define the accident parameters at a more detailed level .This paper describes the analysis approach and results from the first analysis stage.
The SafetyNet project was formulated in part to address the need for safety oriented European road accident data. One of the main tasks included within the project was the development of a methodology for better understanding of accident causation together with the development of an associated database involving data obtained from on-scene or "nearly onscene" accident investigations. Information from these investigations was complemented by data from follow-up interviews with crash participants to determine critical events and contributory factors to the accident occurrence. A method for classification of accident contributing factors, known as DREAM 3.0, was developed and tested in conjunction with the SafetyNet activities. Collection of data and case analysis for some 1 000 individual crashes have recently been completed and inserted into the database and therefore aggregation analyses of the data are now being undertaken. This paper describes the methodology development, an overview of the database and the initial aggregation analyses.
The main focus of the benefit estimation of advanced safety systems with a warning interface by simulation is on the driver. The driver is the only link between the algorithm of the safety system and the vehicle, which makes the setup of a driver model for such simulations very important. This paper describes an approach for the use of a statistical driver model in simulation. It also gives an outlook on further work on this topic. The build-up process of the model suffices with a distribution of reaction times and a distribution of reaction intensities. Both were combined in different scenarios for every driver. Each scenario has then a specific probability to occur. To use the statistical driver model, every accident scene has to be simulated with each driver scenario (combinations of reaction times and intensities). The results of the simulations are then combined regarding the probabilities to occur, which leads to an overall estimated benefit of the specific system. The model works with one or more equipped participants and delivers a range for the benefit of advanced safety systems with warning interfaces.
The focus of the technical innovation in the automobile industry is currently changing to sensor based safety systems, which are operating in the pre-crash phase of an accident. To get more information about this pre-crash phase for real accidents a simulation of this phase using the GIDAS database is done. The basics for this simulation are geometrical information about the accident location and the exact accident data out of the GIDAS database. This aggregated information gives the possibility to simulate an exact motion for every accident participant, using MATLAB / SIMULINK, in the pre-crash phase. After the simulation the information about the geometrical positions, the velocities and maneuvers of the drivers to an individual TTC (time to collision) are available. With those results it is possible to develop new useful sensor geometries using pre-crash scatter plots or estimate the efficiency of implemented active safety systems in combination with sensor characteristics. This simulation can be done for every reconstructed accident included in the GIDAS database, so these results can represent a wide spread basis for the further development of active safety systems and sensor geometries and characteristics
Past European collaborative research involving government bodies, vehicle manufacturers and test laboratories has resulted in a prototype barrier face called the Advanced European Mobile Deformable Barrier (AE-MDB) for use in a new side impact test procedure . This procedure offers a better representation of the current accident situation and, in particular, the barrier concept is a better reflection of front-end stiffness seen in today- passenger car fleet compared to that of the current legislative barrier face. Based on the preliminary performance corridors of the prototype AE-MDB, a refined AE-MDB specification has been developed. A programme of barrier to load cell wall testing was undertaken to complete and standardise the AE-MDB specification. Barrier faces were supplied by the four leading manufacturers to demonstrate that the specification could be met by all. This paper includes background, specification and proof of compliance.
A set of recommendations for pan-European transparent and independent road accident investigations has been developed by the SafetyNet project. The aim of these recommendations is to pave the way for future EU scale accident investigation activities by setting out the necessary steps for establishing safety oriented road accident investigations in Member States. This can be seen as the start of the process for establishing road accident investigations throughout Europe which operate according to a common methodology. The recommendations propose a European Safety Oriented Road Accident Investigation Programme which sets out the procedures that need to be put in place to investigate a sample of every day road accidents. They address four sets of issues; institutional addressing the characteristics of the programme; operational describing the conditions under which data isrncollected; data storage and protection; and reports, countermeasures and the dissemination of data.rn
The national accident statistics demonstrate that the situation of passenger car side impacts is dominated by car to car accidents. Car side to pole impacts are relatively infrequent events. However the importance of car side to pole impacts is significantly increasing with fatal and seriously injured occupants. For the present study the German in-depth database GIDAS (German In-Depth-Accident Study) and the UK based database CCIS (Co-operative Crash Injury Study) were used. Two approaches were undertaken to better understand the scenario of car to pole impacts. The first part is a statistical analysis of passenger car side to pole impacts to describe the characteristics and their importance relevant to other types of impact and to get further knowledge about the main factors influencing the accident outcome. The second part contains a case by case review on passenger cars first registered 1998 onwards to further investigate this type of impact including regression analysis to assess the relationship between injury severity and pole impact relevant factors.
The role of a national motor vehicle crash causation study-style data set in rollover data analysis
(2010)
On 1 January 2005, The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, an agency of the United States Department of Transportation, implemented a new data collection strategy designed to assess crash avoidance technologies and report associated behavioral inputs and outcomes. The original goal was a six-year program, however, during the shortened data collection period; it proved a valuable resource for understanding a precrash environment previously obscured by forensic case investigation. Another unintended consequence was an overlap with infrastructure, roadway geometry, and design with the occupant and vehicle outcomes, by virtue of well-defined attributes. External to the collected data, supplementary information was extrapolated, by using manuals published in the United States, by the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials and selected State Departments of Transportation, in conjunction with the National Motor Vehicle Crash Causation Study (NMVCCS). This provided a backdrop to the infrastructure framework of the rollover problem within which the occupant and vehicle outcomes were studied. If a NMVCCS-style data collection were to be implemented elsewhere, then complementary manuals produced by federal transportation officials might be consulted producing similar relationships. The current study uses NMVCCS data to describe vehicles travelling through diverse design geometries and the outcome for occupants involved in crashes within that system. Codified and extrapolated data form the basis for assessing NMVCCS and its value to the transportation safety community, as the protocols are applicable universally. The benefit in continuing a NMVCCS-style study is noted, as the interaction of roadway infrastructure and occupant protection agencies might find paths to better work together in solving the complex rollover problem using a common data-driven approach.
Although the number of road accident casualties in Europe (EU27) is falling the problem still remains substantial. In 2011 there were still over 30,000 road accident fatalities. Approximately half of these were car occupants and about 60 percent of these occurred in frontal impacts. The next stage to improve a car's safety performance in frontal impacts is to improve its compatibility. The objective of the FIMCAR FP7 EU-project was to develop an assessment approach suitable for regulatory application to control a car's frontal impact and compatibility crash performance and perform an associated cost benefit analysis for its implementation. This paper reports the cost benefit analyses performed to estimate the effect of the following potential changes to the frontal impact regulation: • Option 1 " No change and allow current measures to propagate throughout the vehicle fleet. • Option 2 " Add a full width test to the current offset Deformable Barrier (ODB) test. • Option 3 " Add a full width test and replace the current ODB test with a Progressive Deformable Barrier (PDB) test. For the analyses national data were used from Great Britain (STATS 19) and from Germany (German Federal Statistical Office). In addition in-depth real word crash data were used from CCIS (Great Britain) and GIDAS (Germany). To estimate the benefit a generalised linear model, an injury reduction model and a matched pairs modelling approach were applied. The benefits were estimated to be: for Option 1 "No change" about 2.0%; for Option 2 "FW test" ranging from 5 to 12% and for Option 3 "FW and PDB tests" 9 to 14% of car occupant killed and seriously injured casualties.
An analysis of NASS and FARS was conducted to determine crash conditions that involved injuries that are not currently being directly addressed by vehicle safety standards or by consumer information test protocols. Analysis of both field data and US NCAP tests were conducted to determine the relative safety provided by seating position and by vehicle model year. Opportunities for improvements were determined by crash categories with large populations of injuries that were not addressed by safety tests or smaller numbers that were increasing in frequency. Areas of opportunities include improved occupant restrain in rollovers, improved frontal protection for rear seat occupants and improved fire prevention in frontal and rollover crashes.
One of the major problems of road safety in Europe is the powered two wheelers accidents. One of the European countries with one of the highest rates is Portugal where in 2006, mopeds and motorcycles fatalities represented 27% of all road users deaths. In this work, a deep analysis and overview of the current state of mopeds and motorcycles accidents for the 2004-2006 period is presented. Within this period 830 PTW occupants die, 2958 have been severely injured and 25000 suffer slight injuries. A detailed analysis of the conditions of these accidents has been carried out, using the data of the national accident database. This analysis provides global information, about geographic environmental conditions, driver- characteristics among others. From this data detailed information is obtained allowing to know when, where and who. In order to answer the question why more a widely collection of data has been collect for 70 accidents. The data has been collected using OECD methodology. For these accidents a detailed reconstruction has been carried out, what is especially important for fatal accidents where for instance speed in an important factor. From these collection and analysis of data a wider overview of facts and measures are extracted. Among them, some are emphasized such as that the quality and non-use of helmets plays an important role in severe and fatal accidents especially for accidents involving moped vehicles, or speed is the most important factor in fatal accidents involving motorcycles. Concerning motorcycle accident reconstruction, different tools can be used depending of the accident scenario and complexity. For simple cases, with specific characteristics, analytical formulation based in vehicle crash dynamics can be use in order to determine the impact speed of the vehicles impact, analysing the skid marks, deformations, victims rest position and considering parameters (EES, vehicle deceleration, etc). Aspects such as the energy absorption capability of motorcycles are also discussed. In the general cases the accident reconstruction software Pc-Crash has been used for the reconstruction of the accident. In very complex cases, has for instance the impact between motorcyclist and barriers, Madymo software is used especially to determine speed from injuries. An example of the impact of a motorcyclist and a motorcyclist-friendly barrier is present to illustrate the benefits and limitations of such systems.
The number of road accidents in Portugal has decreased significantly in the last decades, however, this tendency is not similar in all types of transportation. In the most recent years and by European standards, Portugal is still one of the leading countries concerning the number of fatalities in Powered Two Wheelers (PTW) accidents. To this effect, the in-depth investigation of PTW accidents is crucial and so, a thorough statistical analysis concerning the main factors influencing PTW riders injury severity accidents was undertaken regarding the 2007-2010 period in the National Road Safety Authority (ANSR) injured riders database using the software SPSS. In addition, to determine the importance of absent factors in the database analysis, such as velocity, a set of 53 real accidents involving PTW were also investigated and computationally reconstructed using the software PC-Crash. Lateral collisions between a motorcycle, its rider and the side of three different passenger cars were also simulated, varying the motorcycle impact angle and velocity in order to estimate the PTW deformation energy and the rider- injuries, as this accident configuration stands out in terms of frequency and even severity. The results of this detailed study are presented.
Accidents involving two wheels vehicles represent one of the more important types of accidents in Europe. These accidents are usually not easy to reconstruct specially for the analysis of the injuries and its correlation with accident dynamics and evidences. Different methodologies are applied in this work for the reconstruction of two wheeler accidents, especially accident involving motorcycles. From the typologies of road evidences like skid marks, to the use of Pc-Crash and the use of Madymo models, different reconstruction of real accidents are presented. One of the questions that sometimes arise for legal purposes when some type of head injuries arise is if the occupant was wearing or not a helmet. The correlation of head injuries with the use of the helmet is a very important issue, therefore an important legal aspect. One of the key questions for the reconstructions that is difficult to analyze, is if the vehicle occupant, was or not, wearing the helmet. Based on the previously collected information, a generic model of a helmet was developed on CAD 3D, followed by its conversion into finite elements, all in order to perform impact tests using the Madymo software that would help improve the helmet- safety, but that also can be used as a tool in accident reconstruction.
Portugal has the highest rate of road fatalities in Europe (2002 and for Eur-15 - CARE database). For this highest rate, the accidents involving pedestrians and motorcycle occupants have a higher contribution than the European average. In the last years, especially accidents involving motorcycles have been investigated and currently two different projects are being carried out, one related with motorcycles accidents and the other with pedestrian accidents. In these projects, countermeasures among others to reduce the fatalities between these two types of road users are being studied. These accidents are investigated with the commercial accident reconstruction software PCCRASH but also new methodologies based on multibody dynamics are in development in order to more accurately study these two types of accidents. In this paper, the methodologies in use for accident reconstruction and new methodologies in development are presented. Speeding his found to be one of the major causes of road fatalities for pedestrians and motorcycle occupants. In the case of motorcycle accidents, these involve mainly young drivers. Aspects as social behavior are also important to understand the causes of some of these accidents. Some examples of accidents occurring in Portugal, involving especially motorcycles and pedestrians are presented and discussed.
Internationally, the need is expressed for harmonized traffic accident data collection (PSN, PENDANT, etc.). Together with this effort of harmonization, traffic accident investigation moves more and more in the direction of accident causation. As current methods only partly address these needs, a new method was set up. The main characteristics of this method are: • Accident/injury causation (associated) factors can objectively be identified and quantified, by comparison with exposure information from a normal population. • All relevant accident and exposure data can be included: human-, vehicle-, and environmental related data for the pre-crash, crash and postcrash situation (the so-called Haddon matrix). The level of detail can be chosen depending on interest and/or budget, which makes the method very flexible. In this paper the accident collection and control group method are presented, including some of the achieved results from a pilot study on 30 truck accidents and 30 control locations. The data were analyzed by using cross-tabulations and classification-tree analysis. The method proved useful for the identification of statistically significant causational aspects.
Validation of human pedestrian models using laboratory data as well as accident reconstruction
(2007)
Human pedestrian models have been developed and improved continually. This paper shows the latest stage in development and validation of the multibody pedestrian model released with MADYMO. The biofidelity of the multibody pedestrian model has been verified using a range of full pedestrian-vehicle impact tests with a large range in body sizes (16 male, 2 female, standing height 160-192cm, weight 53.5-90kg). The simulation results were objectively correlated to experimental data. Overall, the model predicted the measured response well. In particular the head impact locations were accurately predicted, indicated by global correlation scores over 90%. The correlation score for the bumper forces and accelerations of various body parts was lower (47-64%), which was largely attributed to the limited information available on the vehicle contact characteristics (stiffness, damping, deformation). Also, the effects of the large range in published leg fracture tolerances on the predicted risk to leg fracture by the pedestrian model were evaluated and compared with experimental results. The validated mid-size male model was scaled to a range of body sizes, including children and a female. Typical applications for the pedestrian models are trend studies to evaluate vehicle front ends and accident reconstructions. Results obtained in several studies show that the pedestrian models match pedestrian throw distances and impact locations observed in real accidents. Larger sets of well documented cases can be used to further validate the models especially for specific populations as for instance children. In addition, these cases will be needed to evaluate the injury predictive capability of human models. Ongoing developments include a so-called facet pedestrian model with a more accurate geometry description and a more humanlike spine and neck and a full FE model allowing more detailed injury analysis.
Injury severity of e.g. pedestrians or bikers after crashes with cars that are reversing is almost unknown. However, crash victims of these injuries can frequently be seen in emergency departments and account for a large amount of patients every year. The objective of this study is to analyze injury severity of patients that were crashed into by reversing cars. The Hannover Medical School local accident research unit prospectively documented 43,000 road traffic accidents including 234 crashes involving reversing cars. Injury severity including the abbreviated injury scale (AIS) and the maximum abbreviated injury scale (MAIS) was analyzed as well as the location of the accident. As a result 234 accidents were included into this study. Pedestrians were injured in 141 crashes followed by 70 accidents involving bikers. The mean age of all crash victims was 57 -± 23 years. Most injuries took place on straight stretches (n = 81) as well as parking areas (n = 59), entries (n = 36) or crossroads (n = 24). The AIS of the lower extremities was highest followed by the upper extremities. The AIS of the neck was lowest. The mean MAIS was 1.3 -± 0.6. The paper concludes that the lower extremities show the highest risk to become injured during accidents with reversing cars. However, the risk of severe injuries is likely low.