Every day, emergency workers attend accidents in which children have been incorrectly restrained. The consequences for the little ones can often be fatal. So, what do parents, grandparents, or even taxi drivers have to do when travelling with a child? As it turns out, the answers are not that simple and the relevant knowledge is not easily accessible.
“Today, we are looking to recreate a car accident with a scenario that is quite conceivable in hectic everyday family life. Our aim is to highlight the dangers of insufficient child restraint and to explain, as clearly as possible, the safest way for people to travel with children,” says Daniel Junker, Head Vehicle Expert at Baloise.
The first collision was an eye-opener: One parent was in the driver’s seat, while the other had an unsecured baby on their lap in the passenger seat. Sitting in the middle of the rear bench was a six-year-old restrained only by a waist belt. To their left was a three-year old, correctly secured in a backwards-facing infant safety seat. The accident was recreated using dummies.
Immediately after the crash test, Fabian Aschwanden from DTC AG commented on the consequences of the accident: “This was undoubtedly a very violent collision, in which severe injuries could be expected if restraint systems are not used correctly.”
The analysis of the accident starts in the front, with the driver, who was correctly restrained and therefore optimally protected from the impact. The secondary restraint systems, such as the airbags and seat-belt pre-tensioners, were triggered and this clearly helped to reduce his injuries.
The picture was very different in the passenger seat. Although the secondary restraint systems (e.g. airbags and seat-belt pre-tensioners) were also triggered here, neither the female passenger, who was wearing her seatbelt correctly, nor the baby were sufficiently protected. Because the bodies of the passenger and the baby were in contact with each other, the former would be expected to suffer severe injuries to her upper body and the latter would suffer very severe injuries generally.
Although the child sitting in the middle on the rear bench seat was restrained, this kind of restraint system is clearly insufficient and should be avoided. The child was secured only by a waist belt, which, without use of a booster seat, can quickly shift towards soft tissue areas when being used by children. The child’s upper body and head collapsed into other each and it can be assumed that the child would have suffered severe injuries from their head colliding with their legs or the interior of the car.
Finally, the example of best practice on the left-hand side of the rear bench. Here, the child’s entire upper body, including the neck and head, was secured in the infant safety seat. As a result, there was no acute trauma due to the head striking the interior or in the areas where the seat belt rests. Marco Bütikofer of baby-walz commented: “This example of the use of a ‘reboarder’ – a rear-facing children’s car seat – is obviously ideal. But use of a forward-facing infant car seat, with a correctly positioned seatbelt, would also likely result in much less severe injuries than in the other examples.”
Albin Hugentobler, head of the city of Basel’s traffic police, added: “Infant car seats have to be the right size for the child, they need to be correctly mounted and adjusted, and the child must be restrained in the seat in accordance with the manufacturer’s instructions. Every year, around 300 children are injured in accidents involving passenger cars. The risk of a child being injured in an accident can be greatly reduced by ensuring they are correctly restrained.”
Daniel Junker of Baloise offered the following summary of the crash test: “We found that children always need to be in an infant seat that is appropriate for their age. It is recommended that children up to the age of three be restrained in a backwards-facing car seat. Travelling with unsecured babies or children on your lap can result in fatal injuries for both parties and should be avoided at all costs.”
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