Car Safety Ratings Include New Criteria for 2017
This month, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) released its annual list of what it has determined to be the safest new car models on the market in the coming year. The organization crafts increasingly-high standards for its annual lists, with the highest-rated cars being deemed either a Top Safety Pick or, higher still, a Top Safety Pick+.
This year, the IIHS list of the safest new cars is shorter than it has been in recent years, due to additions made to the criteria IIHS uses to rank the vehicles. IIHS rates hundreds of models as being “good,” “acceptable,” “marginal,” or “poor” in a range of categories including the car’s performance in various types of front-end crashes, the strength of the car’s roof, the head restraint and seat quality, and the quality and ease-of-use of car seat anchors. Last year, the safety organization added a rating of front crash prevention to its ranking, making it so that only cars with front crash avoidance systems that were rated as “advanced” or better could earn the highest safety designation that IIHS awards. This year, the organization added a rating of headlights to the overall safety rating, assessing headlights on the scale from “good” to “poor” based on qualities like glare production and sufficiency of illumination. In explaining the addition of headlight ratings, IIHS president Adrian Lund stated, “automakers have not focused enough attention on whether or not headlamps are aimed such that they light up the road for the driver ahead of them.” Historically, the IIHS rating of “Top Safety Pick” is sufficiently sought after that manufacturers will improve the suite of safety features available on their vehicles to earn the designation, making it so that these ratings increase the availability of safety features market-wide.
Many new vehicle technologies will help keep you safe in a crash by offering advanced collision protection through side airbags or crumple zones, or will keep a crash from happening by automatically applying the brakes or offering other front-end crash avoidance measures. While these technologies can go a long way in stopping a crash from happening, they’re no replacement for cautious, attentive driving. Drivers who rely too heavily on crash-avoidance systems while behind the wheel can still be held liable for injuries they caused through distracted or otherwise negligent driving.
If you’re hurt in a crash in Mississippi and want help getting the compensation you need to recover, contact the Gulfport personal injury lawyer Corban Gunn for a consultation on your case, at 228.284.68059.
