Secondary collisions following a traffic barrier impact:​ frequency, factors, and occupant risk

Gabauer, Douglas J.

Affiliations

Abstract

This study has investigated secondary collisions following an initial barrier impact in tow-away level crashes. The analysis included 2026 barrier impact cases that were selected from 12-years of in-depth crash data available through the National Automotive Sampling System (NASS) / Crashworthiness Data System (CDS). Secondary collisions were found to occur in approximately one-third of tow-away level crashes where a traffic barrier was the first object struck. Secondary crashes were found to primarily involve an impact to another vehicle, an impact to another barrier, or a rollover; tree and pole impacts were found to represent a much smaller proportion of secondary impacts. Through a detailed analysis of vehicle trajectory, this study supports previous research suggesting secondary collision risk is substantial even for vehicles not ultimately involved in a secondary collision. Compared to a single barrier impact, the occurrence of a secondary collision was found to increase the risk of serious occupant injury by a factor of 3.5, equivalent to the serious injury risk difference found between a belted and unbelted occupant in a traffic barrier crash.

Cited Works (2)

Year	Entry
2008	The Abbreviated Injury Scale 2005, Update 2008. ?: Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine (AAAM); 2008.
2009	Gabauer DJ, Gabler HC. Differential rollover risk in vehicle-to-traffic barrier collisions. In: 53rd Annual Proceedings, Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine (AAAM). October 5-7, 2009; Baltimore, MD.131-140.

Cited By (1)

Year	Entry
2017	Vitet S, Schebdat H. Safety benefit evaluation of secondary collision mitigation braking. In: Proceedings of the 25th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV). June 5-8, 2017; Detroit, MI.