Originally Posted by RayCJ
The other thread about the Dearborn plant had me thinking about an accident we had when the whole family was in the car. It was a 1956 Chevy. We were stopped and got rear-ended then shoved into a stopped bus in front of us. Nobody wore seatbelts back then. My father got bruised by the steering wheel, grandmother in the back seat got broken ribs, mother got bruised by the dashboard. All three of us little kids bounced around the inside of the car but we were fine.
As much as I like to reminisce about those old cars, it's a miracle we survived them. My first car was a 67 Plymouth Fury III. Bias ply tires and manual drum brakes on all 4's. Rusty leaf springs and mushy shocks. Now that I think about it, every ride in the rain and Chicago ice and now was a total crapshoot.
Crash survivability: I'll take a new car any day!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtxd27jlZ_g
Carnival stunt for the IIHS.
My response to that was: "Well, D'uh".
Let's see the crash between a 59 Chevy and an 1909 Buick if that's the way the game is being played.
Totally unnecessary waste of an old car. Pure click bait and produced just for an audience primed on yellow journalism. Stating the obvious, such deep observation.
People survived, lived their lives built an economy and a country with out belts, bags, buzzers 5 MPH bumpers, nanny driving systems. Most of the cars and trucks they did that in wore out, fell apart or rusted away and were junked.
Amazing how that 59 Chevy went 50 years without ever encountering an accident as portrayed in that silly video.
Also remember: all the crash stats of a particular vehicle count only among those vehicles within that weight class. No one drives like that. Every accident is as individual as a fingerprint. No safety equipment will ever exist that edits out all of the "what if" variables.
And bless those hundreds of people killed by air bags from the beginning of their development. Just collateral damage I guess.
Funny. I had a car with ABS, traction control, disc brakes, air bags, belts, buzzers, radial tires. Got rear ended in the left turn lane sitting waiting for the red arrow to change at 4:30 in the morning.
Car was totalled. Other than the lap and shoulder belts a bloody lot of good all that equipment did. And I couldn't have been less at fault.
That result would have been the same had I been in the 86 Olds or my 63 Valiant [with seat belts].
And still, 50 years after the first mandated safety laws, half of all motor vehicle deaths are attributable to the occupants not wearing seat belts. Add booze. Add speeding.
Don't do any of that and one's chances of being killed in an accident have been lowered by a sizable amount.