Carol Lodi was in Littleton, Mass., heading to her home in Harvard on a drizzly evening last March, doing 45 miles per hour in her new Toyota Camry, when a vehicle pulled out in front of her.
“There was nothing I could do but hit the brakes and the horn and hang on,” says the 40-year-old Lodi. “I smashed into the rear of her van. I thought, `This is it. I’m going to die.’ “
She didn’t. Her Toyota was equipped with air bags and when the two cars hit, both bags inflated–scaring Lodi almost as much as the accident.
“It sounded like a gunshot in the front seat,” Lodi recalls. “It blocked out any experience of the impact. I forgot I had air bags. Then the car filled with smoke. I thought the car was on fire so I jumped out. Even the policeman called for a fire engine. Smoke was pouring out of it.”
That bang was normal. That smoke she saw wasn’t smoke but rather the powder used to pack the air bag in the hub of the Camry’s steering wheel. And the cop likely wanted a fire engine because leaking gasoline might have presented a threat.
The confusion, however, was real.
“I just wish I had been prepared,” Lodi said. “They don’t tell you how it works. It was frightening.”
Air bags are just one of several safety devices that have appeared on cars in recent years that can frighten and baffle drivers.
With air bags, sensors in the front of the car detect a crash, there’s a loud bang, the bag pops out and a powdery residue fills the car.
With anti-lock braking systems, there’s a pulsing brake pedal and sometimes a grinding noise as a computer pumps the brakes faster than any human could. (Traction control systems work the same way, applying the brakes to wheels that are slipping.)
Thinking something is wrong with the brakes, some drivers take their foot off the pedal, rendering the ABS useless.
And some new GM vehicles have daytime running lights–a dimmer version of headlights used at night–that turn on as soon as the car is started and remain on while it is in operation.
All of that new technology can confuse drivers, but they can find out what they need to know, say safety experts, with a quick check of their owner’s manual, a call to a local car dealer or a call to the carmaker.
“Any dealer that’s selling a car with ABS should ask the owner if they’ve ever had one before, and they should take it out for a test drive and show them how it works,” says Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a Washington, D.C., consumer group founded by Ralph Nader. “Of course, you wouldn’t want to do that with air bags.”
Hedy Wuerz of New York City found out about air bags firsthand. The 55-year-old was driving on the Autobahn in Germany last January when she lost control of her car at 80 m.p.h.
“I really cannot say what caused the accident,” Wuerz said. “I looked at my watch and said, `Great, I’m home in 15 minutes.’ I realized something was happening. The car was tumbling down a hill. I saw something white in front of my eyes. I had no idea what it was. I just remember I saw something white. Then the car stopped.
“There was like a cloudy thing in front of my eyes,” she recalled. “I didn’t smell anything. I thought it could be smoke. I tried my legs and my legs worked. I ran away from the car. I thought it might blow up.
“The cloud, I heard later from police, was talcum powder.”
That powder is used in some air bags when they are packed to ensure that they open correctly, says David P. Dahle, vice president for design engineering for Morton International, a Chicago-based manufacturer of air bags.
“As the air bag unfolds and comes out . . . you’ll have a fine particulate (in the car),” said Dahle. “On some bag configurations, there’s talcum powder in the bag to keep it from sticking together during a long storage, or there’s corn starch. It comes out like dust.”
Among safety devices, air bag deployment may be the most alarming, but Greg Pierce, public relations manager for safety issues for General Motors, said drivers should learn more about ABS.
“It seems there’s a greater misconception regarding the operation of anti-lock brake systems than air bags or daytime running lamps,” Pierce said. “Daytime running lamps are relatively new. Air bags tend not to be called upon very often.
“But . . . it’s not difficult to become involved in a situation where you just might be called upon to use your ABS,” he said.
Using ABS goes contrary to what many older drivers were taught to do–pump the brake pedal to avoid locking up the wheels in a hard stop, he said.
“There is a lack of familiarity with ABS,” he said. “Your mother, your father, grandmother, your grandfather, all told you pump the brakes.
“You have to unlearn that behavior; It’s just the wrong thing to do,” Pierce said.
“You press, you slam, you jerk on those brakes and you hold them. Never mind the back pressure on your foot, never mind the noises you might hear.
“That’s a real tough thing to do for a lot of people–keep their foot on the pedal.
“There is also a perception that ABS will stop you on a dime,” he said. “It is designed to give you added control of steering, but . . . ABS will not allow you to defy the laws of physics.
“It does not change your reaction time,” he said. “If you’re traveling too closely or too quickly for the environment, you’re going to get into trouble and ABS cannot get you out.”
As for daytime running lights, Pierce said GM is putting them on its cars because they are relatively cheap, do not add to the weight, are simple and can reduce head-on accidents. Swedish carmakers also have installed them.
“The studies we are aware of coming out of the Scandinavian countries . . . and Canada (where the lights are in use) indicate there can be significant reductions in daytime, head-on, two-vehicle crashes,” he said.
“The vehicles are more visible,” Pierce said. “We do expect a reduction in those daytime opposite-direction accidents.”
Not surprisingly, Lodi and Wuerz praised air bags.
Said Lodi: “The thing with air bags was I didn’t feel the impact; it took any trauma from the accident. I didn’t even have a headache. The air bag spared me from any injury. I think they’re fantastic.”
Said Wuerz: “I certainly can vouch for air bags. I walked away without a scratch or blue marks or anything. The car was totaled. I had absolutely nothing. The police and the emergency people couldn’t believe it. I had a second chance in life. I definitely think it was due to the air bags.”
