New Technologies and Techniques for NASS Accident investigations

The National Accident Sampling System (NASS) has investigated more than 40, 000 traffic accidents in its six years of operation. This paper discusses some of the new technologies and techniques of accident investigation being adopted in NASS. These include a microcomputer data entry system, the CRASH 3 program for estimating the severity of an impact, a contour gauge for measuring vehicle deformation, and automated scene diagramming techniques. The authors also define some of the unsolved problems in mass accident investigation, and discuss the constraints on solving them.