Priorities for enhanced side impact protection in regulation 95 compliant cars

This paper summarises the main results of an analysis of accident data conducted for the European Enhanced Vehicles Committee (EEVC) WG13 "Side Impact" to inform the further development of side impact test procedures for cars. The analysis of data from three countries was coordinated by EEVC WG 21 “Accident Studies”. The national datasets of the UK, France and Sweden from the year 2005 were analysed containing a total of 411,311 cars. In each country side impacts typically represented 33% of all fatalities but less than 25% of casualties of all severities. Struck-side occupants represented typically 60% of all side impact casualties regardless of injury severity while the remainder of the casualties were seated away on the non-struck-side. Amongst single vehicle side impacts, collisions with poles were most commonly specified, although there was considerable variation between countries. In multi-vehicle crashes the collision partner was a car in about 75% of cases. The relative involvement of each type of collision partner varied by casualty severity and in both the UK and France there were similar numbers of fatalities in collisions with poles as with cars. A comparison of injury risks suggested the risk of serious injury in newer cars struck by other newer cars was similar to older, pre-Regulation 95, cars struck by older cars. This indicates the improvements in side protection since the introduction of Regulation 95 may have been at least partially offset by increases in front stiffness of cars due to the introduction of Regulation 94 and EuroNCAP. The paper presents other details on the circumstances of side impacts and the different driver populations involved in loss-of control and intersection collisions. It links to two other papers concerning car-to-car and car-to-pole side collisions using in-depth data.