Recording Automotive Crash Event Data

The National Transportation Safety Board has recommended that automobile manufacturers and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration work cooperatively to gather information on automotive crashes using on-board collision sensing and recording devices. Since 1974, General Motors' (GM) airbag equipped production vehicles have recorded airbag status and crash severity data for impacts that caused a deployment. Many of these systems also recorded data during “near-deployment” events, i.e., impacts that are not severe enough to deploy the airbag(s). GM design engineers have used this information to improve the performance of airbag sensing systems and NHTSA researchers have used it to help understand the field performance of alternative airbag system designs. Beginning with the 1999 model year, the capability to record pre-crash vehicle speed, engine RPM, throttle position, and brake switch on/off status has been added to some GM vehicles. This paper discusses the evolution and contents of the current GM event data recording capability, how other researchers working to develop a safer highway transportation system might acquire and utilize the information, and the status of the NHTSA Motor Vehicle Safety Research Advisory Committee’s Event Data Recorder Working Group effort to develop a uniform approach to recording such data.

• Record URL:
  http://www.nhtsa.gov/cars/problems/studies/record/chidester.htm
• 
• Corporate Authors:

  National Transportation Safety Board

  490 L'Enfant Plaza, SW
  Washington, DC  United States  20594

  International Transportation Safety Association

  Apeldoorn,   Netherlands 
• Authors:
  • Chidester, Augustus
  • Hinch, John
  • Mercer, Thomas C
  • Schultz, Keith S
• Conference:
  • Transportation Recording: 2000 and Beyond. International Symposium on Transportation Recorders
  • Location: Arlington VA, United States
  • Date: 1999-5-3 to 1999-5-5
• Publication Date: 1999

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Web
• Features: Figures; Tables;
• Pagination: pp 85-98
• Monograph Title: Proceedings of the International Symposium on Transportation Recorders. Transportation Recording: 2000 and Beyond, May 3-5, 1999, Arlington, Virginia

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Air bags; Brakes; Countermeasures; Crash analysis; Crash causes; Crash investigation; Crash reconstruction; Crash severity; Engine performance; Event data recorders; Highway safety; Precrash phase; Speed; Throttles; Traffic crashes; Traffic safety
• Subject Areas: Highways; Safety and Human Factors; Vehicles and Equipment; I80: Accident Studies;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01088095
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jan 30 2008 12:31PM