Injury Risk of Occupants and Pedestrians Injury Mechanism and Protection Criteria

More information

Main author

Kramer, F.

Co-Authors

-

Type of media

PDF

Publication type

Lecture

Publication year

2008

Publisher

17. EVU Conference, Nice

Citation

Kramer, F.: Injury Risk of Occupants and Pedestrians Injury Mechanism and Protection Criteria. 17th EVU Conference, Nice 2008

English, 19 pages, 19 figures, 9 references

In traffic accidents the injury patterns and distribution of injuries to specific body regions differ
considerably depending on whether the persons injured were involved in the accident as occupants of
the vehicle or as pedestrians. For that reason, the different risks of injury concerning the regions of
the body, which can be derived from the kinematics of the accident, are particularly gone into.
The origin of the injuries, i. e. the injury mechanics, however, are specific for each body part, and
the severity of the injury essentially depends on the approach velocity between the human body part
and the structure of contact as well as their respective stiffness. Therefore, the protection criteria
that have been provided by the relatively young biomechanical research, and stipulated by the safety
legislation, are independent, to a great extent, on the kind of participation in the accident of the
injured person. They characterise certain values of mechanical quantities, like deflections, velocities,
accelerations and forces which describe the boundaries of probability of reversible injuries. These will
be shown in detail, explained and judged with regard to their importance.