Reconstruction of head-to-hood impact in an automobile-to-child-pedestrian collision

Abstract

Head injuries are among the most common injuries sustained in automobile-to-childpedestrian collisions (ACPCs), and are the leading cause of death. The aim of this article is to systematically investigate child impact dynamics, head injury biomechanics and associated tolerance levels. For this purpose, two numerical methods, a multibody system (MBS) method with MBS pedestrian and car models and a facet element method with facet pedestrian and car models, were used to reconstruct an actual ACPC. Reconstruction results revealed good agreement between the kinematics generated by the child pedestrian models and the corresponding values from the actual accident in terms of wrap-around distance and throw distance. Both methods generated similar estimates of head-impact conditions, like impact velocity, impact angle and impact timing. The calculated head injury parameters of these two pedestrian models also exhibited good correlation with the head injuries sustained in the actual accident.