Engineers design first female-modeled dummy to achieve more precise car crash testing

A TEAM of Swedish engineers has created the first car crash-testing dummy based on an average woman’s body.

The most commonly utilized dummies have previously been designed around the average male’s weight and height.

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The new dummy, which is officially called a female seat evaluation tool, will be used to evaluate the quality of today’s auto seatbelts and safety features, BBC reports.

Women are 17 percent more likely to die in a car crash and are 73 percent more susceptible to serious front-end collision injuries than men, National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports.

Researchers hope that crash data from the female-based seat evaluation tool will address key average differences from male dummies.

These average differences include weight, and muscle strength, in addition to hip, pelvis, and torso shape.

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The NHTSA had been using a scaled-down version of a male dummy when gathering crash data since the 1970s.

This smaller-sized male dummy is four-foot-11 inches tall and weighs 108 pounds.

These numbers reflect the smallest 5 percent of women, Smithsonian Magazine reports.

Researchers’ new female seat evaluation tool is five-foot-three inches and weighs 137 pounds, according to BBC.

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Chest shape and lower joint stiffness are critical differences between the Swedish group’s new dummy and the old test standard.

When asked why safety regulators haven’t required an average female test dummy until now, Toyota safety field expert Tjark Kreuzinger said: “When all the men in the meetings decide, they tend to look to their feet and say ‘this is it.’

“I would never say that anybody does it intentionally, but it’s just the mere fact that it’s typically a male decision — and that’s why we do not have [average] female dummies,” BBC reports.

Companies won’t be required to use the new female seat evaluation tool until new laws are passed.

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