When semi-trailer trucks and passenger vehicles collide, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says, mandatory under-ride guards on the sides of tractor-trailer rigs could save lives. The trucking industry, though, says a better solution would be to hasten the rollout of advanced safety technology.
This spring, IIHS has been dramatizing its argument by crashing mid-size cars at 35 mph into the center of a 53-foot-long dry van trailer. It says these crash tests show that a well-built guard on the side of a semi-trailer can prevent roof-peeling car wrecks that are often fatal.
?Our tests and research show that side under-ride guards have the potential to save lives,? said David Zuby, the Institute’s executive vice president and chief research officer, in a press release. ?We think a mandate for side under-ride guards on large trucks has merit, especially as crash deaths continue to rise on our roads.? Federal law requires large trucks to have rear under-ride guards, but side guards are not mandated nationwide. Some cities, including Boston, New York, and Seattle, require side guards on city-owned and -contracted trucks.
The IIHS?funded by the auto insurance industry?and its research arm, the Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI), have been studying under-ride crashes for decades and have been crash-testing and rating rear under-ride guard protection on trailers from the biggest manufacturers since 2011. The tests this spring, though, marked the first time that IIHS ...