Police reports of fatal pedestrian road accidents in London in 1970-71 have been examined, and the times of death extracted. These have been related to estimated speed of impact, age of injured person, and type of striking vehicle. High impact speed tends to lead to quick death. Age has no statistically significant effect once speed is controlled for, bur because a greater proportion of elderly pedestrians area killed by slow-moving vehicles, the elderly appear to die later than the young when all speed groups are combined.
Abstract