Side Airbag Induced Humerus Fractures

Currently, side air bags have been installed in a limited number of cars, and only a few real world crash investigations involving a deployed side air bag have been performed. In order to characterize the interaction between a small female upper extremity and a deploying side air bag, a study was performed that utilized 12 tests with small female cadavers, and 15 tests with the instrumented SAE 5^th percentile female upper extremity attached to the 5^th percentile Hybrid III female dummy. The upper extremity was loaded by a deploying seat mounted thoracic side air bag in a static test environment. A simple fracture of the distal humerus head was observed in one test. A linear regression was performed to correlate occurrence of observed injury and the test parameters. Injury risk functions were constructed for age, forearm acceleration, elbow moment, and air bag inflator level.

REFERENCES:

Duma, S.M., Crandall, J.R., Hurwitz, S.R., Pilkey, W.D., "Small Female Upper Extremity Interaction with a Deploying Side Air Bag," Proceedings of the 42^nd Stapp Car Crash Conference, Tempe, Arizona, November, 1998.

Duma, S.M., Crandall, J.R., Pilkey, W.D., "Dummy Upper Extremity Interaction with a Deploying Side Airbag," Proceedings of the 16^th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles, Windsor, Canada, June, 1998.

back to research page...

Virginia Tech / Wake Forest University Center for Injury Biomechanics