Accident Reconstruction
Airbags
There has been a lot of interest in the area of airbag deployment. Sintra
Engineering has performed a number of investigations into determining if
airbags should have deployed.
In general, airbags save lives. There are problems, however when air bags strike occupants of vehicles during the deployment phase. Typically an airbag will deploy in 20 - 30 ms. During this time the air bag will ignite the sodium azide (producing nitrogen and carbon dioxide) and expand very quickly. The expansion of the airbags is very rapid with the material traveling at between 300 and 400 kph. At these rapid speeds any object within the throw range of the airbag can experience significant injuries from the deployment. These injuries can include facial burns, ocular damage and severed digits. Once the airbags have deployed, they do however, provide an increased level of safety for the driver. Air bags are designed to ensure an unrestrained 50th percentile male will survive a 30 mph barrier impact. This is useful to larger drivers but does present a problem if the occupant is short in stature.
