Child Injury Pattern and Mechanism Differences Based on the Front Seat Occupancy Status in Rear Impacts with Severe Structural Intrusions from the Rear

Child crash injury protection in severe rear impact chiefly depends on how well the rear survival space bounded by the vehicle structure is maintained. Previous research and studies have shown the ill effects of front seatback collapse intruding into the rear child survival space from front with minor or no intrusions from the rear.

This paper shows the child injury pattern and fatal injury mechanism for a rear impact crash with a severe compartment intrusion from the rear without any front seat occupant. Furthermore, it compares the injury outcome with a similar crash and severe intrusion in the presence of the front occupant employing a full-scale vehicle-to-vehicle crash test.

A detailed real-world crash investigation is conducted to identify the injury mechanism and is compared with the outcome of similar severity rear impact vehicle-to-vehicle crash tests producing different injury patterns. The comparison and the analysis show that the survival space intrusion due to safety cage collapse from the rear is the most significant factor in the presence or absence of the front seat occupant. The injury pattern changes with the same overall critical outcome. If the safety cage collapse intrusion and front seat occupancy are considered as two factors modulating the response of the injury pattern, then there is a significant interaction of these factors modulating the response.