Go To Complete Test Results
July 7, 1999
Sport utility vehicles have undergone another crash test. The Insurance Institute For Highway Safety has been crashing SUV's for the past four months. News Specialist Pamela Davis has the results.
One of the vehicles that performed the best in front-end crashes is the 1999
Mercedes M-Class.
There were two other standouts in the tests -- a winner and a loser.
Sport utility vehicles, or suv's, are among the most popular automobiles
on the road today.
Over the past three to four months, the Insurance Institute For Highway Safety
has been testing suv's--- crashing them into barriers at 40 miles-per-hour
to see how they perform in driver side-to-driver side head-on collisions.
Getting a good rating and qualifying as a best pick, the Mercedes M-class
and the Lexus R-X 300.
Getting a poor rating-- the Mitsubishi Montero Sport.
Brian O'Neill, president of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, says,
"Every car or vehicle today has a safety cage, the occupant's compartment, and
the good perfomers in our test that compartment remains largely intact."
Major collapse of the compartment, major intrusion into the drivers space. And
the driver dummy records high injury numbers," he explains.
Mitsubishi maintains the Montero Sport meets or exceeds federal safety
standards and says it is working to improve the design.
The two best performers are pretty expensive. The Mercedes M-Class starts
around $35,000. But, does a higher price guarantee safety?
O'Neill says, "That's not always the case. The fact that the Mercedes and the
Lexus did so well is more to do with the fact that they are relatively new
design, rather than the fact that they are expensive vehicles."
The Institute says these tests show that some SUV's are more safe than
others, and that consumers need to make sure they research the vehicle
they're buying before they drive away from the dealership.
If you would like more information on the insurance institute's crash tests,
click here.
