How to avoid serious injury in an accident

Alas, few modern drivers pay due attention to setting up head restraints. But this product was by no means created for beauty - first of all, it is designed to protect the spines of riders at the time of an accident, from which no one is immune. How to adjust the head restraints correctly in order to minimize the risks of serious injury in an accident, the AvtoVzglyad portal found out.

Although the number of accidents on the roads of our vast Motherland, according to traffic police statistics, is gradually decreasing, the issue of safety is still very acute. And it is not without reason that the authorities regularly conduct social campaigns calling for the responsibility of car owners - a lot really depends on the actions of the helmsmen.

For the safety of the driver and passengers in the car, not only various electronic systems, airbags and belts are responsible, but also head restraints, which for some reason many car owners forget about. They adapt the seat settings for themselves, adjust the steering wheel in height and reach, adjust the interior and side mirrors ... And they neglect the “pillows”, thereby exposing their cervical spine to great danger.

The headrest as a protective tool built into the upper part of the seat was invented by the Austrian designer Bela Bareni in the late sixties of the last century. Numerous studies have confirmed that this device minimizes the likelihood of whiplash—injury to the neck due to sudden flexion/extension—in road crashes that strike the rear of the vehicle. And those happen quite often.

Head restraints can be either a continuation of the seat back or a separate adjustable cushion. And if the former are mainly found in sports cars, then the latter are widely used on mass-produced cars. In addition, head restraints are divided into fixed and active. They, as you might guess from the name, differ in how they work.

Mostly expensive cars are equipped with active head restraints, but this option is often offered for an additional fee to those who are looking at a simpler car. How do they work? In the event of an impact that hits the rear of the vehicle, the driver's body, by inertia, flies first forward and then sharply backward, subjecting the cervical spine to a huge load. The active "pillow", unlike the fixed one, "shoots" in the head at the moment of the collision, picking up and holding it in a safe position.

Headrests - both fixed and active - require extremely precise adjustment in order to maximize their effectiveness in an accident. Automakers recommend adjusting the "pillows" in such a way that the rider's ears are flush with the middle of the product. However, you can also navigate along the crown, which should not stick out because of the headrest. Far from the last role is also played by the distance between the back of the head and the product: the safe distance is at least four, but not more than nine centimeters.