Congress sat back and let trucks become heavier, taller, and deadlier. Now pedestrian fatalities are at a 40-year high.

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The Center for Auto Safety is the nation’s premier independent, member driven, non-profit consumer advocacy organization dedicated to improving vehicle safety, quality, and fuel economy on behalf of all drivers, passengers, and pedestrians.

Michael Brooks, the executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, alluded to that simple law of physics in a conversation with Insider when he noted “there’s a kind of an inextricable link between the weight of vehicles and the forces in a crash.”

By Madison Hall
March 24, 2023

Canadian civil engineering technologist Myles Russell put his pen to paper and spent over 100 hours calculating the sightlines of various vehicles.

He didn’t expect to find that an M1 Abrams battle tank had a better sightline than some everyday trucks.

And while vehicles are increasingly becoming equipped with sensors and cameras to limit the damage they cause, Russell said that mistakes and errors can happen. And when they do, lives will be on the line.

“Physics doesn’t care about cameras, sensors, ABS, and other tech. Tech fails, and when it does it’ll be pedestrians, children, cyclists, and those in smaller, more sensible cars that will pay,” said Russell.

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