Car safety developments must be smooth and fast – and constantly refined

THE Fiat Punto’s recent zerostar Euro NCAP crash test score provoked a range of reactions when it was announced. Some people questioned how a car that was awarded five stars when assessed in 2005 could score ‘nul points’ when retested today, while others were more surprised to learn that the Punto was even still on sale.

The most significant aspect of the poor result, however, is that it highlights how far safety standards have risen in recent years, and how hard car makers – including Fiat, with other models – work to fit stateof-the-art tech to minimise the frequency and impact of accidents.

On the same day as the Punto’s score was announced, for example, electronic stability control (ESC) was handed a Prince Michael International Road Safety Award for its contribution to safety. ESC – developed by Mercedes and Bosch in the nineties – is said to have prevented 188,500 serious crashes since 1995 in Europe alone.

Or take Volvo’s decision to create an open patent for the three-point seatbelt back in 1959, leaving others free to use it. Then there’s autonomous emergency braking (AEB), which is said to reduce rear-end collisions by 38 per cent. AEB is becoming increasingly standard even on budget cars, and is set to become mandatory in the near future.

It’s likely we’ll soon view cars without AEB as being as antiquated as those without seatbelts. All this shows that the pace of development in safety is too quick and important for complacency to set in.

“Pace of development in safety is too quick and important for complacency to set in”