Volvo Pedestrian Airbag System - joins the existing Pedestrian Detection and City Safety systems

Volvo, long regarded as a global leader in the area of automotive safety has announced the world's first pedestrian airbag system. Airbags inside of automobiles have saved thousands of lives worldwide since being put into widespread use.  Volvo has a reputation for making the safest cars in the business, and they’re keeping with that reputation by fitting the first pedestrian airbag, as a standard onto their entire Volvo V40 range.

Volvo cites statistics that shows 25 % of Chinese road fatalities are pedestrians. In the United States, 12 percent of all traffic fatalities are pedestrians and in Europe 14 percent. The new Pedestrian Airbag technology joins the existing Pedestrian Detection and City Safety systems in reducing injuries.

The system is only active from about 12 mph to 30 mph, as 75 % of pedestrian accidents occur at around 25 mph. The system uses seven sensors placed at the front of the vehicle which transmit signals to a control unit.  The Pedestrian Airbag Technology will work in conjuncture with Volvo’s Pedestrian Detection system with automatic braking.

The airbag only takes a few hundredths of a second to fully inflate if the car comes into contact with a foreign object. The control unit performs calculations to determine if the object is a human leg, and if interprets the signals as coming from a human, the airbag is deployed. In its inflated position, the airbag covers the entire windshield wiper recess, about one-third of the windshield and the lower part of the A-pillars.