EMBRACE LIFE - YOUR SAFETY BELT IS YOUR FIRST POINT
OF CALL !
A safety belt, otherwise called a seat belt, is a vehicle safety gadget
intended to secure the passenger of a vehicle against hurtful development that
may come about amid an impact or a sudden stop. It is one of the most effective
means of reducing the number and severity of injuries in motor-vehicle crashes.
Seat belts
are considered as Primary Restraint Systems (PRS), because of their vital role
in occupant safety.
However, it is really disturbing to find out that people have to be
punished for not putting on their safety belts
That sure is a problem. Should this be
the case? Should one be forced to protect his or her own life?
Well, we are forced to believe that most of these people find little essence of having a seat belt in their vehicles, to even understand the need
to put them on.
Take a look inside most commercial vehicles in Ghana and
you will find out that all the safety belts have been cut off from their
respective seats except for the front seats. As if passengers in the back seats
are not vulnerable should there be an accident.
To the extent that sometimes,
taxis do not also have seat belts in them and even if these vehicles have seat
belts in them, it seems most of the drivers and passengers deliberately
forego them.
The police check-point is the only thing that
propels drivers to put their seat belts on. A few meters away from the Police
check – point and they take the safety belts off, faster than they got them
on.
The question of why all the seat belts are mostly
taken off their seats after the vehicle has been cleared from the harbor still
lies unanswered. I just do not understand why they choose to do that. Perhaps someone
here could help us out with an answer.
A passenger might not really have a choice of
putting on a seat belt if he or she is seated at the back or might as well
ignore it out of ignorance. Or is it that they are not used to seat belts?
But what of the people we assume should know much
about these things?
The last trip I took with some colleagues got me
thinking as well. How could university students be in a vehicle with seat belts
fitted to each seat but I could count only three people including the driver
with their seat belts on. I fear this might be the case in other institutions.
All these partly accounts for the numerous lives
lost on our roads. Let’s just save the statistics for another day.
Today, we want to take a look at the safety belt .
Why at all do we find them in our vehicles and why are the law enforcement
agencies stressing on the need for drivers and passengers to put on the safety belt?
The main purpose of a seat belt is to keep vehicle
occupants safe in the event of a crash. The seat belt functions by keeping the
occupant in a more static motion despite a sudden stop or change in momentum.
A
car moves with inertia, which is an object’s tendency to move until something
works against the motion of that object. When the vehicle hits something, or is
hit by something, that inertia changes.
Without the seat belt, occupants can be
thrown into various parts of the interior of the car, or thrown completely out
of the car. The seat belt usually stops this from happening.
But How ?
Mechanism for locking the seat belt
- The silver-colored bead (ball sensor) moves forward
- The ball sensor pushes the braking claw (actuator) upward
- To lock the belt, the actuator engages with the lock gear, thus keeping any additional webbing from further extraction.
WHAT REALLY HAPPENS WHEN THERE IS AN ACCIDENT
When in motion, the driver and passengers are traveling at the same speed as the car. If the car suddenly stops or crashes,
the driver and passengers continue at the same speed the car was going before
it stopped. A seat belt applies an opposing force to the driver and passengers
to prevent them from falling out or making contact with the interior of the
car.
With no seat belt to
stop the driver and the passenger with the car they will continue traveling
forwards once the car has reached a sudden stop.
If the vehicle is traveling
at 50mph and crashes into a brick wall, instantly reducing its velocity to
zero, the passenger will continue moving forwards at 50mph unless there is
something in front of them to create a 'stopping force'. This is because the
velocities of the car and passenger are independent.
Any person in the vehicle who is not constrained by a seat belt is subject to these extreme dangers. A seat belt stops you with the
car, which is almost always a much larger stopping distance than your
stopping distance when you are flying free and collide with something.
Riding
in the back of a pickup truck or holding onto a car in any way takes away the
protection of a seat belt and airbag. Since the force to stop your body in even
a low speed collision is in the range of tons, there is no way you can hold on
and prevent injury. A shorter stopping distance always means a greater impact
force on you.
But how strong is the safety belt? Can it hold all that pressure ?
Yes !
How Strong Are Seat Belts?
The belt
portion of the seat belt system is commonly called “webbing.” Approximately 300
polyester fibers are woven finely into a single belt to make up the webbing.
With
this number of fibers, the strength of the belt has been measured to hold a
weight of about three tons which is almost the weight of three compact cars. So you have no worry. Just put yours on.
WHAT IS THE WAY FORWARD ?
Several laws have been passed with so many meetings
with transport union co-operations but we still see nothing different.
Mr Beckley (The then acting Chief Executive of the DVLA ) said
the implementation of the law in 2014 on the use of seat belts was to achieve a
50 per cent reduction in deaths and serious injuries associated with vehicle
accidents by 2020.
But with so many laws with little enforcement and so many
political interference, how do we
achieve this goal ?
It comes back to you . You are responsible for your own safety.
Do not forget that , your safety belt is your first point of call should there be an accident. Do not comprise upon safety . Use your seat belt.
YOUR FAMILY NEEDS YOU ALIVE . WE NEED YOU ALIVE!
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