The aim of this paper was to present injury risk functions based on real-life frontal crashes where crash severity was measured with on-board crash pulse recorders (CPR). Results from 178 frontal collisions with an overlap of more than 25% and with an angle within +/- 30 degrees from straight frontal have been analysed. A mix of 18 car models of 4 different makes was included. The study shows the potential in using real-life data to establish injury risk functions to be used as guidelines in the design of a crashworthy road transport system. The results showed variations in the ability of explaining risk of injury depending on the crash severity parameter used. Acceleration seemed to better describe injury risk than velocity change of (delta V) in frontal impacts. In order to have lower than 25% risk of an Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS) 2+ injury, mean acceleration should be kept below 8 g and peak acceleration below 26 g. At every crash severity interval, women had a higher injury risk of AIS1 injuries than men. Also the risk of AIS2+ injuries was higher for women than for men at a crash severity above 25 km/h or 7 g. At every crash severity, older drivers above 50 years of age had higher risk of AIS2+ injuries than drivers below 50 years of age. Drivers had higher AIS2+ injury risk than front seat passengers at mean acceleration above 8 g. At crash severities where the airbags are likely to be deployed, a large reduction in the risk of AIS1 and AIS2+ injuries was found.
Samenvatting