🚀 go-pugleaf

In <4mltfm$o8c@cynic.portal.ca> curt@cynic.portal.ca (Curt Sampson) writes:

>In article <4mlebk$1ih@cascade.cs.ubc.ca>,
>Jason Harrison <harrison@cs.ubc.ca> wrote:

>>My goodness, look at all of the people worried about an impact in a
>>vehicle WITHOUT seat belts or other restraint systems.

>This is a classic case of lack of analysis.  Let's consider what
>a restraint system does. It prevents a seated person from flying
>forward though the windshield. What causes a seated person to fly
>forward? A (very) sudden stop, of course.
...
>Given the difference in mass, if a bus crashes into a car (or vice
>versa), it's not hard to see which vehicle is going to move a
>relatively large amount and which is going to move a relatively
>small amount. We can reason that in these sorts of accidents
>unrestrained passengers on the bus are not likely to suffer injuries
>as serious as unrestrained passengers in a smaller vehicle would.

>The accidents that can produce comparably serious injuries in
>unrestrained passengers are those where a bus crashes into or is
>hit by an object of similar or greater mass (a building or a cement
>truck, for example). In both cases, we presumably have fewer
>accidents, becuase we have professional drivers driving all of the
>vehicles involved.

   Even in this case, there should be less injury to bus passengers.  If a
bus hits a brick wall, it's not going to decellerate as quickly as a car
would, because of its greater mass.

--
   Steven Leffler                   |   It is well to remember that the
   leffler@physics.ubc.ca           |   entire universe, with one trifling
   University of British Columbia   |   exception, is composed of others.
   CANADA                           |              --John Andrew Holmes