How are rollovers survivable?

Posted on April 19, 2008 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

One of the obstacles victims of rollover accidents face is the stereotype that rollovers are inherently dangerous.  This isn't usually, and certainly not always, the case.  Rollovers tend to be very survivable, especially when compared to a high speed side impact collision or a head on collision.   The forces at play are dissipated along several axes in a rollover, whereas in side impact and head on collisions, the forces tend to operate in straight lines and along one axis.

Not to say rollovers aren't deadly.  There are approximately 10,000 deaths in the US alone per year due to rollovers.  Most of these are single vehicle accidents.  Roof crush and occupant ejection are the single biggest factors in these fatalities. 

Occupant ejection is minimized by the use of safety belts equipped with pretensioners (these devices were first introduced in 1981).  When searching for a new vehicle, especially an SUV or light truck, make sure to ask if its seat belts are equipped with pretensioners as these will decrease the likelihood of occupant ejection in a rollover event.

Roof crush, on the other hand, is not so easily fixed.  Maintaining occupant survival space is the first goal of successful engineering, yet too many of today's SUVs do a lousy job of this.  Look at this example of a simulated Ford Explorer rollover.  They will roll it twice, not unlike what would happen if the vehicle rolled at highway speeds.  Make sure you watch the full video.  On the first roll, you'll see the passenger side leads, and maintains its survival space, while the driver's side already shows sign of deadly intrusion.  On the second roll, you'll see there is no survival space left on the driver's side.


There is no way the driver walks away from this.  On the flip, we'll show you another test where a rollover seems hardly violent at all.
 

This is the same test run on the Explorer, two rolls, but here on a Volvo XC 90.  What the full video, and notice how survival space remains completely intact.


Both the driver and the passenger walk away from this.  Thanks to Xprts LLC and CIR for making these tests publicly available.  You can learn more about these tests, and how simple modifications can improve existing technology to save lives here.
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Ford Rollover Lawsuit

Posted on March 30, 2008 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

Ford has recently lost a lawsuit in New York. This case gives value to the argument that the roof standards in our vehicles need to be reexamined. And more importantly manufacturers must ensure that they selling a product that is within the standard. In addition, this case raises yet another defect that we have been seeing lately in various cars: cruise control issues.  Ed Bell and his law firm in Georgetown, SC represented plaintiffs in this action on liability.  We congratulate Ed and his team and hope this verdict sends a message to Ford: safety is job one.

Ford must pay $6.5 million to the family of a 60-year-old man who died in a 2000 rollover accident involving an Explorer, a New York jury said Thursday.

The family of Steven Motelson claimed a cruise-control defect caused him to lose control of the Explorer and that an inadequate roof failed to protect him in the subsequent rollover.

Read the Article

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Walking and A Rollover

Posted on March 16, 2008 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

Due to the crashworthiness and products liability focuses at our law firm, we unfortunately hear about deaths caused by rollovers quite often and even more often deaths caused by SUV rollovers. The grief a family mist endure is heart wrenching. However, once in awhile we hear about or read about someone taking such a tragedy and doing something to move forward in a positive way. These stories provide a sense of hope and also keep the focus on working towards tougher safety in vehicles.

After everything that he has been through, Lee Wagner has decided to go for a walk. 

Not a routine stroll, but a 380-mile journey on a surgically repaired knee in an effort to raise money for the scholarship fund that bears the names of his two children. 

The walk will take him through Georgia and both Carolinas. As he walks, he will share his story, his wife Debbie Wagner’s story and most importantly, the story of their beloved children, Jillian and "Little" Lee Wagner, with anyone who cares to join him for a mile or two along the way.

Lee Wagner will walk because he wants to raise awareness about traffic accidents and SUVs.  He will walk because people grieve in different ways. He will walk because after four long years, “The pain is still fresh,” as he continues to search for moments of peace. Read the entire article


   
 
 

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Roof Crush

Posted on August 27, 2007 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

A new study relates that strength of a car's roof to its ability to prevent  serious injury  in a rollover crash.

A new report from the University of Alabama has studied Ford's own internal crash test data and concluded that the strength of a vehicle's roof is absolutely critical in preventing death or serious injury in the event of a rollover incident. Read More.


Ford has resisted this common sense conclusion for decades in its defense of hundreds of crashworthiness lawsuits.  In these suits, Ford argues that serious injury and death are not a function of roof strength, but instead these injuries a function of violent rollovers.  Implicitly, and sometimes explicitly, championing the position that rollovers are so violent no roof can help, no matter how strong.

I'm hopeful independent analysis such as the above study will continue to resist this overly literal and self-interested interpretation of rollover accidents.  No one disputes that a rollover can generate strong g-forces inside the cabin.  But vans rollover and SUVs rollover... period.  Strong roofs keep heads, necks, and other vital body parts inside and safe from the those deadly gs.  Just ask the many NASCAR drivers who rollover their cars at speeds in excess of 150mph and walk away from these crashes with little more than a scratch.

No reason, other than profit and price, that you can't have the same.

But this brings up another point.  The argument Ford has been using for so long is  flawed on another, more legalistic level.  The inquiry Ford is making preeminent when they argue this way is: could the occupant survive this very deadly crash?

That's a very narrow way of looking of products liability.  Classically, the inquiry is opposed to the above.  That is to say, the focus of the issue is not whether or not there's any way to prevent the damage, but rather whether the risk of the harm justifies the cost of amelioration.

Put another way, in classic legal tort theory we presuppose that you can build a crashworthy vehicle.  And in almost all cases this is true.  Only the most violent, least likely, esoteric collision situations are "un"engineerable.  If that isn't true folks, we are in some trouble cause it means our engineers have hit the wall of innovation.

After we presuppose crashworthiness, we then ask: is the cost of making  the vehicle crashworthy in balance with the potential harm should it remain uncrashworthy.

With around 5,000 SUV deaths alone per year, I would argue we haven't quite hit the cost threshold just yet.  And more importantly, I think most people faced with the question framed in this broad context  would come to the same conclusion.
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Volvo XC 90 Rollover testing

Posted on July 21, 2007 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

Pretty impressive engineering behind this test.  While I can't be certain, I am told that one of Ford's hunkety hunks was in the stands watching this test.  Hopefully that person was taking careful notes.

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The Physics of Rollovers

Posted on July 20, 2007 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

Rollovers kill about 10,000 people a year in the US.  This is a slightly accelerating trend due to the popularity of SUVs.  Understanding how rollovers occur can help in prevention, and it can also help in understanding why manufacturers can help reduce rollover accidents with SUVs and other automobiles.

I often try to explain the nuts and bolts of the physics involved, but I'm no physicist.  Here's a good article on the topic.  Right up front the problem is spelled out in plain english:

The reasons why SUV rollover accidents happen so often are simple High School Physics. With a high center-of-gravity and a comparatively narrow track, such vehicles are relatively unstable as a natural fact. Unless either the track is greatly widened or the center-of-gravity lowered, the situation cannot be improved.

In other words, even your grandma knows why SUVs flip, cause they're too tall and narrow.  I call them "skin and bone"... mainly cause no one wants to admit they're riding around in nothing but "skin and bone" but also because its the truth.  If they made SUVs a little fatter (as in a Humvee) or a little shorter (as in a station wagon) the problem would simply not occur as often.  But that's not physics, thats just common sense as Mark Twain might say.

I won't bore you with the play by play of the long(ish) article on the physics of rollovers, but I will say that you should read the whole thing, while I point out some interesting tidbits... such as this nugget:

In physics, a force can be thought of as a "resultant force" which is a combination of two "component forces."

We know that the tire treads are going to somehow be involved, especially since we know that on icy roads, the vehicle does not turn. So we know that the sideways force must be being applied between the tire treads and the roadway.

That's right.  Our good friends "the tires" don't just make sure our ride is smooth, they make sure we're riding on the ground and not flying through the air.  Thats why you don't usually see a product liability action against an auto manufacturer involving a rollover without the tire company as a named defendant.  Anyway, just wanted to point that out... tires, and tire selection, are a huge part of the rollover epidemic.  Also of note:

The center of gravity is always above the ground. For a fairly tall vehicle like an SUV, it can commonly be 30" (or more) above the ground. Vehicle manufacturers used to divulge the height of the center-of-gravity of their vehicles, but they no longer do.

Emphasis added with a final "gee, don't you wonder why?" at the end!
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Accident on I-40 Kills Charles Wilson

Posted on July 17, 2007 by Law Office of D. Hardison Wood

Our thoughts and  prayers are with the  family of Charles Wilson.  He was the victim of  the horrible crash on I-40 where an SUV hit a van and then rolled over on top of Charles Wilson as he cleaned up trash along the road.  View the latest  video from WRAL.

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