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There is little or no doubt that air bags save lives in accidents. Passenger side air bags are generally effective safety devices; however, in special cases there are damaging side effects. Damaging and unintended by-products of [passenger side] air bags include, but are not limited to, injuries such as abrasions, broken bones, and damaged knees. Passenger air bags are especially threatening to short people (generally under 4' 10”), to those who allow the passenger seat to be placed too close to an air bag, to various size children, and especially to rear-facing infants. Placing the passenger seat too close to an air bag can be classified as “misuse.” Misuse also include those who may place their feet on the dash, and then either lose, or have legs severely damaged when the air bag deploys. Even though air bags were designed to take into account as much of the population as possible, anomalies do exist.

This paper and its companion presentation deal with a set of concepts for reducing damage to occupants of vehicles engaged in catastrophic frontal, side-frontal, or in any form of “head-on” collision. The concepts are such that they do not come into play unless and until an eminent catastrophic situation occurs. These concepts are not designed to be deployed in cases where vehicle(s) are likely to remain in a state from which they can be repaired. The concepts in question are only designed to be activated in catastrophic situations that cannot be reversed, in other words, when a situation reaches a point of no return.