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This paper describes the correlation of a person's age to the risk of injury occurrence and the corresponding injury severity in traffic accidents. A representative sample of belted drivers was analyzed by using data from the German In-Depth-Accident Study (GIDAS) to investigate the influence of age on injury severity and special injuries to different body regions. The study focused on two age groups: 17-30 year old (younger drivers) and older drivers 50 year old and older (50+). The injury risk was described as a function of delta-v and injury risk curves based on Abbreviated Injury Scale (AIS). Furthermore, individual parameters like age and body mass index (BMI) as well as age and mass of the vehicle were considered. The statistical analysis was carried out using descriptive and multivariate statistics. This paper presents an overview of injury patterns of belted drivers and the probability of these drivers being injured in different accident scenarios.

In this study, the accident simulation tests, the so-called crash tests, enforced by legislation and put into praxis are evaluated in regard of their conformity with reality. They are based on accident analyses from investigations at the place of accident, which are carried out by a scientifically trained team which documentates details of the accident event. 826 cars involved in traffic accidents with cars, trucks and other objects, in the greater vicinity of Hannover (FRG) were at our disposal for evaluation purposes. The study clearly reveals that impact simulations like those carried out at present, cover only approximately 34% of all situations of road traffic. This conclusion is derived from a comparison of accident framework conditions like overlapping degree, impact impulse direction and impact situation. For the frontal impact the offset impact, with two-third degree of overlapping, without rail-bound lead should be favoured.

Estimating the potential benefit of advanced safety systems by simulation has become increasingly important during the last years. All over the world OEMs and suppliers carry out benefit estimations by simulations via computer models. Such simulations should, of course, be based on real world scenario such as the pre-crash phase of real world accidents. Several methodologies for building up accident scenarios have been developed in the past. This paper shows a new method for generating pre-crash scenarios directly from the reconstruction of the accident by using the software PC-Crash1. The new method was developed by the Medical University Hannover (MHH) and the Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation Dresden (Fraunhofer IVI). It is based on transferring all information (participant-, vehicle-, environment- and motion-data) from the reconstruction file into a scenario-database.

The In-Depth Investigations of the Accident Research Unit Hannover (Germany), which have been carried out since 1973 are described in the paper. The importance of the detailed analysis consists in the method, in the statistical approach and the continuous data collection over the years. The government as well as industrial manufacturers use this data. Since 1985 a statistical procedure including a mathematical weighting procedure has been applied. About 1000 cases per year are collected. In the paper, principal aspects in the technique of data collection, definitions of variables and possibilities of data usage are described. The limitations of in-depth investigations are discussed in principle, and demands for a worldwide level are pointed out.

The national accident statistics demonstrate that the situation of passenger car side impacts is dominated by car-to-car accidents. Car side-to-pole impacts are relatively infrequent events but result in disproportionate rates of serious and fatal injuries when compared to those in car-to-car side impact. Hence their importance has been highlighted in recent studies. For the present study two approaches were undertaken to better understand the scenario of car-to-pole impacts in Germany. The German in-depth database GIDAS (German In-Depth-Accident Study) and the UK-based database CCIS (Co-operative Crash Injury Study) were used. The first part or the study is a statistical analysis of passenger car side-to-pole impacts to describe the characteristics and their importance relevant to other types of impact and to gain further knowledge about the main factors influencing the accident outcome.