Research Papers (2009 – 2013)

Abstract

During a rollover event occupants can become ejected from their motor vehicle. The occupant ejection trajectory can provide information relating to the vehicle location at the time of ejection, the vehicle ejection portal of the occupant and the source of the occupant injuries. The objective of this study is to validate a method to compute the ejected occupant trajectory during a rollover. The occupant trajectory analysis is based on estimating the vehicle positions and orientations during a rollover event and then applying a transformation function to determine the equivalent positions of the ejection portal of interest. The occupant ejection velocity is computed as the time derivative of the ejection portal positions. The ejected occupant landing and rest positions are computed for each possible ejection location to produce a series of landing and rest position curves. Various methods to estimate the vehicle rollover positions and orientations were investigated. The predicted occupant trajectory results were validated against the results of previous real world rollover case studies. A simplified graphical analysis was proposed.

Ed S. McCarron