Passive restraints and other failures

Question:  Would you stand behind a piece of bullet-proof glass that you had just witnessed stopping a bullet fired from a .357 pistol and allow that same pistol to fire a bullet at you?

Probably not!

Yet we will rely on an untested air bag and seatbelts to prevent serious injury in a frontal collision every day that we drive our cars during rush hour traffic on our over crowded interstate highways. 

I’ve been thinking about such matters ever since my daughter was involved in a collision from the rear while she was waiting for a traffic light to change so she could get on a ramp and travel a portion of our local interstate highway to get to work.

Her air bags DID NOT deploy under those circumstances.  Not only that, but the back of her seat failed to keep her upright during the crash and that failure put her body into a position where the seatbelts could not do the job for which they are intended.  When her car was shoved into the car in front of her, her body slid under the seatbelt far enough for her abdomen to break the bottom portion of the steering wheel and allow her legs and knees to collide with the steering column and dashboard with violent force.

I wondered why her air bags had not deployed in that instance.  I searched the Internet for information and found more than I really wanted to find.

The first item I encountered told me that the hinge mechanism on most modern car seat backs must adhere to a set standard…one that requires it to remain locked in position should another car strike that car from behind while moving 15 mph.  Anything above that speed and you have no  promise of continuing restraint. No help when one needs it the most.

I can’t seem to find out how fast one must be going when they hit something to make the air bags deploy.  The air bags on the fellow’s car that hit our daughter’s car must have deployed because he was able to get out of his van after the crash and walk up to the daughter’s window to check on her condition.  She said that he did not seem to be injured at all. Of course, she could not get out of her own car to go check on the other two people involved.  It was nice of them to do what she could not.

As if she didn’t have enough to worry about due to this accident, someone had to mention something to her about “Gap Insurance.”  I have never heard of that kind of insurance, nor did I understand why anyone would need it.  She worries about everything and anything whether it applies to her or not.  Maureen looked it up on the Internet and told her not to worry about it. She didn’t think these circumstances put her into the position of needing it. I still haven’t grasped exactly what Gap Insurance is so I guess I need to do some more research and find out.

I guess that’s all I have for now.  Thanks for reading.