While full frontal crash regulations have been associated with reductions in injury risk, research indicates that lower extremity injury risk remains high. The objective of this paper is to examine the nature and severity of lower extremity injuries and HARM resulting from narrow offset crashes. These crashes are of particular interest as frontal crash structures are often not effectively engaged by the collision partner and the subsequent intrusions can be high.

Analysis of an Australian real-world in-depth crash database found clear differences in injury se- verity between narrow offset, wide offset and full frontal crashes, with a logistic regression analysis adjusting for crash severity revealing significant differences in the likelihood of the occurrence of injuries, with offset frontal crashes being between 2.6 and 2.9 times more likely to sustain MAIS2+ injuries to the lower extremities than fully distributed impacts. Furthermore, wide offset crashes were 3.7 times more likely to result in a MAIS2+ injury to the upper portion of the lower extremities (femur and bony pelvis) and narrow offset crashes 2.5 times more likely to cause injuries of MAIS2+ to the lower portion of the lower extremities.