A car crash, millisecond by millisecond
From The Age: Anatomy of a car crash.
This is a reconstruction of a crash involving a stationary Ford Falcon XT sedan being struck in the driver’s door by another vehicle travelling at 50 km/h. One millisecond equals 1/1000th of a second.
0 milliseconds – An external object touches the driver’s door.
1 ms – The car’s door pressure sensor detects a pressure wave.
2 ms – An acceleration sensor in the C-pillar behind the rear door also detects a crash event.
2.5 ms – A sensor in the car’s centre detects crash vibrations.
5 ms – Car’s crash computer checks for insignificant crash events, such as a shopping trolley impact or incidental contact. It is still working out the severity of the crash. Door intrusion structure begins to absorb energy…
It takes 150-300 milliseconds for the human brain to register that it’s been in a car crash. The crash is usually over by the time the occupant of the car realizes he’s in one.
Answers to questions you might be asking, unless you wandered onto this site purely by accident >>>
February 24th, 2009 at 00:45
As someone who’s been in one, I was actually aware of the crash before the other car hit ours. Turns out, that is really not a good thing. The people at the ER said people who did not see it coming (provided everyone has their seatbelts on and you’re not running into a semi) recover quicker than those who knew it was coming. Something about the way you tense up your body to prepare your body for the crash is not good. Case in point I was going to the PT for about 4 months after the accident whereas by then-bf now husband who btw, lost consciousness, was totally fine in less than a month.
February 25th, 2009 at 00:42
from “why the toast always langs butter inside down: the science of murphy’s law” by richard robinson:
page 27:
“in emergencies the neuronal clock can speed up a lot more. people often report that when they were in a crash everything seemed to happen in slow motion. in fact it is they who were thinking in fast motion.”
February 25th, 2009 at 00:43
correction on book title: “always lands”, not “langs”.
February 25th, 2009 at 03:07
I actually have run into a semi (or more accurately a semi lost control and crossed lanes and ran into me) at around 60km/h, along CP Garcia in UP. I tensed up my body before the impact and my vision went totally white when the left front side hit the left front side of the semi (it jackknifed and my car hit the gas tank). Fortunately, I was driving a 1979 mercedes benz with a body built like a tank and I was wearing my seat belts. The driver side door was wrecked, but I crawled out through the passenger side- totally unscathed, except maybe in a bit of a shock. I’m not sure if I recovered quickly enough but I just sat by the gutter for maybe 5 minutes. Then I got angry and started throwing things at the truck driver — and at my car!