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Unread 01-11-2006, 14:25
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Kyle Kyle is offline
Mike Wade, RIP You will be missed
AKA: Kyle Rice
FRC #0365 (MOE)
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Re: There is still a vast amount of work to be done...

Although Air bags have made significant decreases in the number of U.S auto fatalities there is much more the those numbers then just air bags, now cars are made to break apart and absorb the shock but only in perfect conditions, when I am at work and see a car roll over all the side airbags in the world would do nothing to stop the door from pinning the occupants down or the steering column from becoming attached to the driver or front seat passenger(s). I see car accidents almost every shift if not 2 or three on bad weather days and now that most newer cars have side airbags in them the difference in injuries is significant but they still do not stop flying objects, ejections from seats and passenger compartment intrusion by a vehicle part or whatever the vehicle hits.
My main point to all this is its not just the air bags that needs to be worked on its the whole vehicle that needs to be made safer
You read about front and side impact ratings for cars and the numbers are great for those but what about when the car is upside down? Or what if the car is struck at an angle? These are the things that are very important.
Also something that I experienced just 24 hours ago on an accident scene
A car collided with another going about 55-65 mph on Interstate 95 southbound at the MLK exit in Wilmington the cars air bags deployed and the occupants had minor injuries but the car was struck again prior to EMS and Fire Department arrival and the occupants were then severely injured, I can almost be certain in saying that if the airbags would stay deployed those people would have walked away instead of one being flown out in a helicopter.
There have been some great strides in the auto safety industry over the past decade and just in the past few years, gas tanks are much much less susceptible to igniting during an accident and also wider bases and tires that help to prevent roll over from happening.

My main point to all of this is we need to make cars much safer in all aspects and also the drivers need to be safer, so please drive safe and take those extra seconds to stop and to look around I hope you don't have to find out if your air bags work well enough to safe your life.

Sorry if this is all out of order this is a topic that I am very happy to be seeing discussed here, I hope that one day one, or more, of the many great engineers that FIRST puts out will solve some of these problems
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