Vehicle-safety tests need to be updated

Herb Weisbaum • Profile • E-mail

If you had to pick one feature everyone wants in a new car and it would probably be safety. Fuel economy, design, performance and reliability are all important, but safety is critical.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s star-based rating system was designed to make it easy for consumers to see how a particular vehicle performed in a variety of government crash tests and compare it to other models. But that rating system, which started in 1994, is out of date and needs to be changed.

“It no longer accomplishes its primary purpose – to identify those vehicles which are safer and those that are less safe – because all the vehicles now get four or five stars,” explains Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety.

For example, every 2008 SUV rated by the government got five stars in the side-impact test. In the front-impact test, 96 percent of them got four or five stars. But all of these vehicles do not provide the same level of protection.

“NHTSA’s ratings were good in the past,” says David Champion, senior director of auto testing for Consumer Reports. “But today, we put much more credence in what the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety does in their testing.” Champion says the IIHS tests are more stringent and better distinguish between good and poor vehicles.

“It’s pretty clear that we need to raise the bar and we’re going to do that,” says NHTSA spokesman Ray Dyson. Last year, the agency proposed changing its crash test program to make it harder for vehicles to earn five stars. NHTSA says it wants to improve the current front-impact and rollover tests. It would also like the ratings to reflect that a vehicle has some type of proven crash avoidance technology, such as electronic stability control.

The auto industry seems to support the idea of improving the government’s crash tests – with a number of qualifications. Wade Newton, of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, tells me any changes must result in true safety benefits and “be based on sound science, field data and careful analysis that truly reflect real-world conditions.”

What needs to be done?
When the side-crash test was developed, most of the vehicles on the road were passenger cars. So the current test simulates a passenger car slamming into the side of the vehicle being tested. But 50 percent of the vehicles sold today are SUVs and pickup trucks. They have much higher bumpers than passenger cars.

“That means these tests are only simulating what might happen 50 percent of the time,” says David Champion of Consumer Reports. He wants NHTSA’s tests to reflect the bigger vehicles on the road today and consider additional factors in scoring the results.

Right now, the government’s frontal crash test measures impact to the head and torso of the occupants. That makes sense, since injuries here are most likely to result in death. Champion would like to see leg injuries incorporated into the safety ratings. “There are many debilitating injuries from crushed leg bones that could easily be recorded during those tests,” he says.

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