Why do people die when they hit a tree if all modern cars have air bags?
In: Engineering
Trees don’t have crumple zones, if they don’t break they stop a car *very* quickly. There’s only so much an airbag can do…if you stop the car fast enough the airbag can’t stop you before you run into the dashboard or seatbelt or both.
When a car hits another car they each have several feet of compression to absorb energy. Even if you hit a wall you at least have the full width of bumper and crush zones to absorb and dissipate energy. A tree has basically no flex and is thin enough that most of the built-in crumple zones of the car can’t get into play. The car can’t dump enough energy fast enough to keep you safe.
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