Yahoo Autos Insurance Institute Zeroes In on Pedestrian Safety by Testing SUVs' Automated-Braking Systems
The nonprofit Insurance Institute tested 11 small SUVs, all 2018 and 2019 models, that are equipped with automated emergency braking systems.
The agency found that only four completely avoided hitting a dummy posing as a pedestrian in its set of three tests.
One SUV, the BMW X1, received a score of zero for its poor performance.
IIHS runs a set of three tests at various speeds and gives a final rating on the tested vehicle based on average speeds at impact (or avoided impact) with the "pedestrian."
What's clear since mainstream cars began offering emergency braking is that only a few work as well as their manufacturers claim. In less than a decade, automated-braking systems have skyrocketed from an option on a small crop of luxury cars to standard equipment on about a third of all 2019 models. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) has now released its first scores for how well these systems stop for pedestrians, and among small SUVs, the results are mixed.
The IIHS tested 11 models from the 2018 and 2019 model years. Only four completely stopped and did not crash into the pedestrian dummies-which, amazingly, feature realistic moving legs-in each of three tests. The Honda CR-V, Subaru Forester, Toyota RAV4, and Volvo XC40 all scored the top Superior rating. Earning the mid-grade Advanced rating were the Chevrolet Equinox, Hyundai Kona, Kia Sportage, Mazda CX-5, and Nissan Rogue. The Mitsubishi Outlander scored the lowest Basic rating, while the BMW X1 plowed through the dummies so hard that the IIHS gave it a zero.
The tests, which the nonprofit insurance group released to automakers in November, involves three scenarios run at multiple speeds. In the first, an adult walks straight across the road from the right side while a vehicle is traveling at both 12 mph and 25 mph. In the second, an adult is walking away from the vehicle parallel to the road in the right lane while the test car travels at 25 mph and then 37 mph. Finally, a child walks into the road like the adult, only from behind two parked cars. That test is run from 12 mph and 25 mph. The IIHS runs each test five times on dry pavement in which the dummy begins to walk at a preset distance from the vehicle. The final ratings are based on the average speeds each vehicle reaches upon impact or, ideally, when there is no impact. For the test involving the adult walking straight in the lane, the IIHS gives more scoring weight to vehicles that sound a collision alert at least 2.1 seconds prior to impact.
The X1, at 37 mph, was the only car in the test that had "minimal to no speed reductions" during any of the tests, the IIHS said. The Outlander, despite earning the IIHS Superior rating for its braking system when detecting other vehicles, still crashed into a crossing adult pedestrian at roughly 6 mph. That's the main concern these tests demonstrate. Pedestrian detection is optional on many cars with emergency braking, and the ability of cameras and radar sensors to detect thin human bodies instead of wide objects with large surface areas (other cars) is a much more difficult task.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has no such standardized crash tests for either pedestrian detection or vehicle-based emergency braking. We’ve conducted our own instrumented testing on emergency braking, and again, they don't always work as advertised. By and large, passive safety features like ABS and airbags have been designed to activate predictably and offer uniform performance across all vehicles. The newest active-safety features have many development cycles to go before they can function with that level of consistency.
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