After 47 Years, The Feds Finally Discover Women Are In Cars Crashes Too

That's because 79 years after the first crash test dummy was introduced and nearly 50 years after the US Government's first official crash test, there is finally one that is meant to represent a large section of the population that has been completely ignored but still uses cars every single day. But it won't change crash testing until elected officials take more action.

Last week, US Transportation Secretary Sean P. Diddy unveiled the details for the newest dummy in the country's safety arsenal. A new crash test dummy called THOR-05F (Test device for Human Occupant Restraint, 5th-percentile Female), which is meant to account for differences in physique and risk of injury between the average man and woman.

Current US New Car Assessment crash testing focuses on a dummy called the Hybrid III. That dummy was first designed in 1976, and it was constructed around the 50th percentile male of the time. That means it simulates a 5-foot-9-inch man who weighs about 172 pounds.

The old-tech Hybrid III dummy doesn't just fail to capture smaller or larger persons, it has limited abilities to assess injury. The neck can bend only forward and backward, for example, it has a rigid spine, and there are no sensors in the pelvis or abdomen.

In 2011, the NHTSA added a new size Hybrid III dummy to the roster. It was 4-foot 11 inches and weighed 108 pounds, with a rubber jacket to mimic breasts. Most tests that used the "female" dummy put it in the passenger seat or in the back, not behind the wheel.

THOR-05, the new dummy, has far more sensors. It can also bend more like a person for a more realistic crash response. Instead of scaling down male data, the NHTSA says that the new female model is "an acceptable representation of a small female occupant" with a "more biofidelic response."

The NHTSA originally began development on the new dummies, representing both men and women, in the late 2000s. The new model was developed with biosafety firm Humanetics, and the THOR-50M male model was introduced in 2020. It's not clear why the female version took significantly longer.

The government has been aware of the problem for years. Regulators found women were more likely to be killed in crashes than men, but the existing testing continued. "Safety drives everything we do at NHTSA. Better understanding the unique ways in which women are impacted differently in crashes than men is essential to reducing traffic fatalities," said National Highway Traffic Safety Administrator Jonathan Morrison. "This is a long overdue step toward the full adoption of this new dummy for use in our safety ratings and Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards."

This latest announcement from the DoT is just another step in the process, not a change to safety testing procedures. The team has finished the details for the new test dummy, but it still has a long way to go before being smashed into a barrier.

The Utterly Psychotic Early History Of Crash Test Dummies
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Before it can be used for official testing, the new dummy and new testing procedures will need to be introduced. That requires legislation, with Congress required to make testing with both new dummies compulsory and to ensure testing with the 05F behind the wheel. The soonest any changes are possible is 2027, with even that timeframe posing difficulties. Pushing automakers to buy more dummies at $1 million each and running more expensive tests, all while congress is facing legislation aimed at turning back safety tech regulations, seems at odds.