Hi everyone,
I've been following this thread on injuries related to steering wheels and
wanted to add my 2 cents for what it's worth. I've worked on a medevac
helicopter in Conneticut and at University of Maryland's Shock Trauma Center
in Baltimore, MD. I have seen the immediate aftermath of many fatal and
near-fatal MVAs and I endorse the earlier statement which read along the
lines of "if you've impacted the wheel hard enough to splinter it, you've got
bigger problems than those splinters." A rapid deceleration can produce
forces strong enough to shear the aorta; blunt trauma arising from contact
with something like the wheel will regularly result in flail chest,
pneumo/hemothorax and hemopericardium. In these instances massive internal
bleeding, or puncture of the lung)s) can culminate in circulatory collapse
and hemorrhagic shock/respiratory arrest. The truth of the matter is that if
you impact the wheel hard enough to deflect it you've met statistical
criteria which place you in the same fatality risk as if your passenger died,
you had 3 foot or greater vehicle incursion, etc. - in other words you're
SOL. The best thing to do if you want to maximize your chances for survival
are to fit a steering column which telescopes and collapses under impact -
not the rigid rod type.
Regards,
Bill Shear
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