Page 7 - IAV Digital Magazine #420
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Crash Test Dummies Get Heavier as American Body Weights Rise
By Claudia Buck
It’s come to this: America’s crash-test dummies are getting older and fatter.
In an effort to more accurately reflect the U.S. car-driving popula- tion, at least one manu- facturer is making crash-test dummies – the pretend people used to test automobile safety features – bigger and older.
“The typical patient today is overweight or obese – they’re the rule rather than the exception,” said Dr. Stewart Wang, direc- tor of the University of Michigan International Center for Automotive Medicine, in a statement. “You can’t talk about injuries without talking about the person.”
The new crash-test mod- els include a 273-pound dummy, more than 100
pounds heavier than nor- mal, as well as a proto- type based on an over- weight 70-year-old woman.
“The condition, size and shape of an individual is hugely important in how severe their injuries are in any given crash,” said Wang, who has studied crash injuries and works with automotive engi- neers on safety research.
In frontal crashes, for instance, obese drivers tend to “submarine,” or slide under the lap belt, the University of Michigan research found. An obese per- son’s lower body tends to be loosely restrained because his or her lap belt has far more slack. As a result, obese driv- ers suffer a much higher rate of more severe lower-extremity injuries.
The new elderly dummy
prototype has a body-mass index of 29. Its torso and chest have been redesigned, sagging a bit more than the slimmer physique of a typical crash- test dummy. According to Wang, an individ- ual’s chest struc- tures change between ages 20 to 80, which means the risk of
chest injury goes up fif- teenfold.
“Few would have envi- sioned that people would drive into their 80s, but we have to look at that,” according to a statement by Chris O’Connor, pres- ident and CEO of Humanetics, a Plymouth, Mich.-based maker of crash dummies. “As the population changes, we must have test equip- ment that resembles consumers today.”
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