seifert@ihuxl.UUCP (01/30/84)
[ moved from net.followup ] > However, in my car, I don't wear the shoulder belt. Why? Because > said belt cuts me across the throat when I do wear it, and it > would decapitate me should an accident happen. Such is the problem when stylists and bankers try and design cars. Cars designed by engineers don't have these problems. shopping for a racing harness, -- _____ /_____\ from the flying doghouse of /_______\ Snoopy |___| ____|___|_____ ihnp4!ihuxl!seifert
lat@wbux5.UUCP (01/31/84)
[yummm...this line tastes good (not THAT kind of line, silly)] Well, I just couldn't stay out of this one any longer. Here's my $0.02 worth on this subject. I never used to wear seatbelts. Sometimes I still forget to put them (it, whatever) on when I get into a car. But then again, old habits die hard. Fortunately, most of my friends wear seatbelts, and that helps to reinforce this "habit". I learned the hard way about wearing (or should I say not wearing) seatbelts. I have been involved in 3 major car accidents -- two when I was the driver and one when I wasn't. All three times, I was not wearing a seatbelt. The first time, I lost control of my '73 Gremlin and ran head on into a tree doing about 45 miles an hour. The whole car was totaled. I flattened out the steering wheel, hit my head on the windshield, and then broke the back of the bucket seat from the force of impact. I had stitches in the corner of my eye, and stitches on my kneecap. I will always have the scars. I was also told that I was lucky to be alive, considering I wasn't wearing a seatbelt. Thank god I was by myself... if there was anyone in the passenger seat, and they weren't wearing a seatbelt, they would be dead. Need I say more about this one? But I thought I was invincible (I was 18 at the time). So, it was only natural for me to not wear a seatbelt. The second accident was in my '73 Opel. I hit a patch of ice (we had no idea that it had gotten slippery out, and it was a thin glaze, not something you were immediately aware of...by the time we realized it, it was too late). I slid around the corner, across the road, and into the wooden guard posts, which, needless to say, won the fight. They didn't even budge. I still have the picture of the car. The front end of the driver's side was totaled, the frame was completely out of shape, the passenger side window shattered. I hit my head on the steering wheel, and my passenger hit her head on the dash. But, once again, nobody was seriously hurt, besides my Opel. So I really didn't learn my lesson. The third time, I wasn't driving. I was a passenger in my friend Dave's Maverick. No seatbelts. He took a corner too fast (no flames please, unless you are a perfect driver, of which there are none), and we went over the wall and took a three foot drop. The car landed on the passenger side, and did not have a straight piece of metal or frame left. All four tires were flat, the front side window on the driver's side shattered and fell in on us, and the windshield shattered and, luckily, fell outside instead of inside. Miraculously, the side window on my side stayed intact. We both had to go to the hospital...I had done a job on my shoulder, and Dave had broken ribs. If we had had seatbelts on, I don't think we would've gotten as hurt as we did. The injuries resulted from being thrown around the car as we went over the wall. I'm not trying to preach to anyone, and I am not trying to make this a bid for sympathy...all this happened a while ago. I am just trying to get a little first-hand experience into this discussion, rather than some of the second-hand stuff I have been reading. Granted, there is always that one-in-a-million chance that the seatbelt might get jammed and you won't be able to get it undone, but personally, I will take that one-in-a-million chance. (Besides, I already did that when I was just knee-high to a grasshopper...I stuck the buckle into the latch cockeyed, and couldn't get it back out...but that's another story altogether). Laurie [ihnp4, houxf, mhuxt]!wbux5!lat CSO \ 185 Monmouth Parkway \ West Long Branch \ NJ \ 07733 \ (203)-870-7491
tjt@kobold.UUCP (02/02/84)
Greg Woods (hao!woods) asks (in net.followup -- I'll reply here):
How does the insurance company get to determine that the injured driver
(in a serious accident, of course) was not wearing a seatbelt? Would
you trust this judgment to *your* insurance company? I sure wouldn't!
One possibility: people here have previously stated that seatbelts
won't prevent *all* injuries. In fact, if you were wearing seatbelts,
and the accident was severe enough to cause you serious injuries, I
would expect to see some characteristic injuries. e.g. bruises and
abrasions where the seatbelt cut into your lap and chest.
I'm not sure how you would determine if you were wearing seatbelts in a
less severe accident (i.e. no injury from the seatbelt itself),
although I would also expect that most of these accidents would result
in little or no injury anyway if you were wearing your seatbelt so you
wouldn't have an insurance claim (at least, not for personal injury --
property damage to your car is another matter).
If you want a more objective test, I'm sure that something could be
built into the seatbelt mechanism itself to record peak stress. I'm
not sure what the likelihood for fraud would be here. Presumably it
would be too difficult and expensive to crash your car once with a
dummy inside it in order to "pre-stress" the seatbelt and then not wear
it.
I think that there is already perceptible damage to a typical
inertia/retractor seatbelt mechanism in a serious collision since I
vaguely recall some notice in some new car book that advised inspecting
or replacing the seatbelts after any serious collision.
Note: I have not been personally involved in a serious accident, with
or without a seatbelt. If you *have*, feel free to confirm or deny any
of this.
--
Tom Teixeira, Massachusetts Computer Corporation. Westford MA
...!{ihnp4,harpo,decvax}!masscomp!tjt (617) 692-6200 x275srm@pyuxnn.UUCP (SR Marcovici) (02/02/84)
Here's MY personal seatbelt story - I'll try to keep it brief: I've always worn seatbelts (shoulder harnesses, or whatever) and besides the fact that I feel uncomfortable WITHOUT them on, I'm convinced that they do save lives; I believe they saved mine and my wife's. We were stopped behind a large american station wagon who was waiting to make a left turn. This was on a 2 lane highway, just a shoulder on each side to pass - in any case I was simply waiting behind this car until he made his turn, so I could proceed straight ahead. With no warning a Cadillac smashed into the rear of my Toyota Corona and propelled us forward at a fairly quick speed - we were forced back into the seats so hard that the seat backs reclined fully. I managed to regain a semi-upright position in time to see us careen off the wagon in front of us. We then veered into the lane of oncoming traffic - luckily no one was coming our way - and continued another 50 feet or so until the car came to a stop. My injuries were limited to some bad bruises caused by the seat belt, and some cuts on my knees (I've got long legs). My wife was bruised on the face by the shoulder harness, and that's it. It was obvious that without the belts on we would certainly have sustained serious injuries, if not worse. My car was totalled; the driver of the Caddy was cited for reckless driving and was never fined/sentenced since she was a resident of NY and this occurred in NJ (she simply didn't show for the court date). Of course I'm glad to have survived, but I do feel anger at having saved this woman alot of grief because we chose to protect ourselves - due to the circumstances, she got off scott free. BUCKLE UP! Steve Marcovici AT&T BELL LABS ..pyuxnn!srm
warren@ihnss.UUCP (Warren Montgomery) (02/06/84)
Here is a not entirely serious suggestion for using of all of that expensive airbag technology. If it works, you could just have some sort of dye capsule in the dash spray a harmless but difficult to remove dye at driver and passenger under crash conditions. Non-bucklers would be branded by the presense of dye where their belts should have been and the lack of dye on their belts. Isn't technology marvelous? -- Warren Montgomery ihnss!warren IH x2494
burt@axiom.UUCP (Burt Janz) (02/07/84)
I, too, had a bad crackup way back in '72 while on the way to Fairly Ridiculous U. in Hackensack. I ran off the road and the car not only spun around but flipped over and landed on the driver's side. My seatbelts were on. If the hadn't been, I probably wouldn't have been able to type this response. And, to those worried about getting their belts off, CARRY A F***ING KNIFE!! I have a knife attached to the front of my seat (driver's side). It's in a small canvas bag with one of those nautical boat-type snaps on it. The bag is sown to the seat. If I crack up (which I hope NEVER to to again) and can't get the belt off, there's a knife available.... The knife is one of those cheap locking kind you get for 2.99 out of a magazine or a cheap tool sale at a motel.... Burt Janz
srm@nsc.UUCP (Richard Mateosian) (04/08/85)
In article <393@nmtvax.UUCP> robert@nmtvax.UUCP writes: > >What do you think of mandatory seatbelt laws? It's about time. >My '61 Bug didn't even have seatbelts. How could I comply? Neither did my '56 Ford or my '58 Pontiac, so I *paid money* to have them installed. I've used seat belts *every* time I've driven for at least the last 25 years, and I always use them as a rider when at all possible. I honestly don't understand the fuss people make about wearing them, and I was shocked to hear how low a percentage of people wear them. -- Richard Mateosian {allegra,cbosgd,decwrl,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!nsc!srm nsc!srm@decwrl.ARPA
carnes@gargoyle.UChicago.UUCP (Richard Carnes) (04/13/85)
>>1. Unbelted drivers are far more apt to lose control of their >>vehicles than belted drivers, thus endangering others. > >Let's see some statistics for this one. This claim is frequently made by experts in traffic safety. I do not know if studies have been done specifically to assess the magnitude of this effect in preventing serious and fatal injuries. However, the Transportation Research Institute of the University of Michigan and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration have performed or sponsored numerous studies of motor vehicle safety, and the researchers in these organizations would be able to give a better answer to this question than I can. Another source is Elaine Petrucelli of the American Association of Automotive Medicine. Her phone number (published in some literature I have) is 312-640-8440. If someone less lazy than I am would like to contact these organizations to obtain further information and report back to the net, I would be grateful. However, even without hard numbers, common sense would indicate that a driver who is alive, uninjured, and seated in front of the steering wheel can maintain better control of his car after it has been struck than a driver who is dead, unconscious, on the right side of the car, or plunging through the windshield. Serious injuries and fatalities can occur at speeds of as low as 12 mph. It is easy to imagine accidents in intersections or on freeways, for example, in which an unbelted driver would lose control of his vehicle and hit a pedestrian or another car, particularly if the driver is not very resilient physically, as in the case of many elderly people. (Lord knows there are enough drivers on the road who need all the help they can get just to stay between the white lines.) At any given moment, only about 1 out of 7 American motorists has his/her belt fastened, a remarkable statistic in light of the wide publicity given to the effectiveness of seat belts. I would be very interested to know, from those reading this who do not ordinarily use their belts, how you account for the fact that you do not. Is it simply a matter of habit? Do you believe that belts increase your risk? Do you believe the protection is not worth the trouble, like wearing a helmet to protect yourself from meteorites? Do you simply forget? Do you support mandatory belt-use laws? You can mail me a response if you prefer. Finally, someone suggested that cops would feel embarrassed about writing out tickets for non-use of belts. Let me suggest that you ask a cop or state patrolman whether he prefers writing the tickets or scraping someone off the pavement and then telling the nearest relatives that the victim is now dead or a vegetable. Richard Carnes, ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes
kenyon@nmtvax.UUCP (05/06/85)
If you believe that insurance companies are gong to share much of the savings with drivers, you are crazy. If I were an insurance company I would push this thing to the hilt and spend all the money I could find to get this control passed. Then I could complain to the govern- ment for two years complaining that I was broke and I needed to make up for all the money I spent trying to get it passed. In other words, the driver gets screwed like always! We, the under 24 year-old-unmarried males are already bent over by the insurance companies. I thought about getting married just to decrease my premiums. I could have saved thousands by now! (O.K. hundreds.) I'm sure insurance companies pushed the minimum coverage and mandatory coverage and they haven't even paid for that fight yet... Robert Kenyon ...ucbvax!unmvax!nmtvax!kenyon ---------------------------------------------------------------------------