Building victims for rollover accidents.

• Position: Crash Test Dummies

While rollover crashes account for about two percent of all automobile accidents, they constitute roughly one-third of all occupant fatalities--about 7,500 highway deaths each year in the U.S. Yet, there currently are no crash-test dummies specifically designed for rollovers.

Researchers at the University of Virginia Engineering School's Center for Applied Biomechanics, Charlottesville, using a $5,000,000 grant from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and $2,000,000 from car manufacturers, have determined that there are no crash-test dummies that reflect accurately how the human body may react to and become injured in this type of crash.

Mechanical engineer Jason Kerrig an used the funds to develop a unique full-scale indoor rollover crash test sled system. It can rotate a sport-utility vehicle--the type of vehicle most susceptible to rollovers--at 400 degrees per second and drop it onto a moving roadbed, simulating a rollover accident. With the system in place, he studied occupant injury risk and vehicle structure crashworthiness.

"Rollover crashes can take up to 10 to 15 seconds to complete as a vehicle rotates and often makes repeated strikes on a roadway--a long period of time for a person, or dummy, to be undergoing those kinds of circumstances," says Kerrigan. "When you're in a car that is airborne and rotating, your body is being drawn toward the roof with up to four times the force of gravity. You're upside down or you're on your side or you're at an angle and, when you hit, it's going to be a severe impact. We're trying to understand that as well as possible through precise and repeatable tests."

Data from that testing is helping Kerrigan's team delve into how to make a better dummy, one that will be humanlike, or "biofidelic"--mimicking, as much as possible, the size, shape, weight, and flexibility of an actual person undergoing the prolonged and unique stresses of a rollover crash.

"Manufacturers design and tailor the crash safety features in their cars--such as airbags, seats, and seatbelts--based on how crash test dummies respond in various scenarios, such as rollovers," explains Qi Zhang, a Ph.D. candidate with the...