The rising popularity of ride hailing services like Gett, in which Volkswagen just invested $300 million, is leading regulators to run crash tests with dummies in the back seat, reports Bloomberg.
As of 2019, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will be putting crash test dummies in the back seats of the cars it tests as part of the 5-Star Safety Ratings Program.
“People assume a 5-star rating extends to all seating locations, but it doesn’t,” Kristy Arbogast, engineering director of the Center for Injury Research and Prevention at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia told Bloomberg. “The back seat hasn’t kept up.”
Besides adult passengers, the rear seats have a lot of catching up to do for child passengers, as well. Bloomberg reports that there are dozens of child fatalities every year that the crash testing might help prevent.
Some fixes are relatively simple, like pre-crash seat-belt tensioners, while others are harder to tackle. Air bags, for instance, are difficult to implement in the rear seats, although side air bags have been helping.
Whatever the solution, rear seat safety should improve over the coming years.
The post Crash Test Dummies Move to Back Seat Thanks to Apps Like Gett appeared first on VWVortex.
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