The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety recently decided to implement a new crash test into their series of simulation tests to see what would happen when a car’s front corner hit a wall or median. When the driver’s side front corner of a car strikes another vehicle or a barrier, the driver is often injured. This is because the impact is so close to the driver and often shreds the front of the car when the crash occurs. The new test has been tried on many different models of cars, and one fact has remained consistent: luxury cars aren’t passing. Vehicles from BMW, Mercedes, and Lexus have all earned poor ratings when put to the test with this new crash. The “corner crash” is actually quite common. Drivers will drift too close to a barrier or another car and clip the side, but the high speeds often send them barreling out or destroy the front of the vehicle.

The crash force in this accident transmits to the front wheel, the suspension system, and the firewall. This makes it so that the front wheel may push into the cabin and cause serious leg and foot injuries. Sometimes, the crash causes the body of the vehicle to force inward, crushing the person who is in the driver’s seat. The tragic occurrence has caused the deaths of many drivers in the past. The auto industry may be able to provide more effective protection against “corner crashes” if they installed passenger safety cages hidden behind the front bumper in the car’s body. This would help to reduce the force of the crash on the inside of the car. Crush zone structures are already built into many vehicles but they normally only protect hits from the front.

Only three of the 11 luxury cars that were tested on the new course were able to pass. All of the vehicles tested were 2012 models. The reason that the cars continually failed the tests is because they don’t have enough protection in the form of a crush-zone structure. This is normally placed inside the car to protect a driver from being killed in one of these crashes. The director of Consumer Reports’ auto testing program says that if luxury cars aren’t passing the new crash test, chances are that lower-end cars won’t have much success either. He says that the crash-cushioning in the front corners of a car isn’t a major ticket item that is on every car manufacturer’s list. He assumes that it will take 5 to 10 years for the big automobile manufacturers to get it right. He said that he hopes that the results of the new crash test will motivate manufactures to spend a little more time looking at the safety features on the front of the car.

The insurance group’s test rams 25 percent of a car into another barrier at 40 mph. They plan to incorporate the test into many of their testing routines. The president at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a man named Adrian Lund, says that most cars fare well in all the other frontal crash tests that are conducted at the institute. Yet there are still about 10,000 fatal frontal car crashes a year. He says that many of these crashes are probably “small overlap crashes,” which is why this test that facilitates a small overlap crash will be so essential to improving automobile safety.

The Acura TL and the Volvo S60 were the only two cars that received a “good” rating when put to the test, and the Infiniti G received an “acceptable” score. The BMW Series, Lincoln MKZ, Volkswagen CC, and Acura TSX all received a “marginal” rating, while the Audi A4, Mercedes-Benz C-Class, Lexus IS 250/350 and Lexus ES 350 all were rated “poor.” Lund hopes that the crash test ratings will motivate automobile companies to create cars that are safe and can avoid these severe crashes that take people’s lives every year.