Fatally injured struck side occupants in side impacts

Accident and injury information extracted from records held by H M Coroners was used to examine a series of questions raised during the development of a side impact test procedure. The field accident data is analysed in ways which allow comment to be made on both the relevance of proposed whole vehicle testing, and the nature of injury criteria that need to be applied to side impact dummies. The relationships between skeletal and internal injury are explored for the head, thoracic, abdominal and pelvic regions. Patterns of injury suffered by fatally injured struck side occupants are described in detail. (A)