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tonight a first of its kind investigation into fatal car crashes. fox nine
investigators spent three months criss-crossing the state to take you
inside the mangled frames of wrecked cars and trucks involved in rollovers. what they
found should change the way you drive that's because nearly every death and
the rollover crashes they investigated
could likely have been prevented
here's trish van pilsum
you can only cover so many fatal crashes in which the grieving family members swear
their loved one
always wore seatbelt before you start to wonder a couple of things - do people
actually wear seatbelts as often as they say or is life so cruel that the one and
only time that they don't wear a seatbelt
is the time they roll the car
either way
there's no undoing the fatal mistake
at first it's eerie to climb into a car in which someone has died
but then i realized they didn't actually die here
but in the ditch
or on the road
if they'd stayed here they might not be dead at all which is the point of all
this
this one mistake
cost her her life
it's hard to imagine the grief that follows a traffic death - we'll have to find
a new normal, to learn how to live without her - getting any worse
we have to mourn the loss of her but we also have to mourn the loss of our dreams for her
when you see a car like brianna remers, it just adds to the
list of things that
you suffer through
or like the one sitting in don rasmussen's tow lot
we see a lot of it
uh... over the years ..dozens of people certainly would have lived
had they had a seatbelt on. you think that maybe this person didn't have to die
it's enough to make you cry. i get too emotional for this
when young people die it's harder. and he doesn't even know the people
he just tows the cars and hears the stories
stories like
this one
richard rains
has kept his son's car.
i kept it to prove a point. his son dylan and dylan's girlfriend
died when the car rolled
and they were thrown. you can't believe it
he was a seatbelt person, i believe she was too
three months ago the fox nine investigators asked the minnesota state
patrol
and every county sheriff in the state to tell us when someone was killed or
seriously hurt
when they were thrown from their car and this usually meant a
rollover crash. it's tumbling like a football - football's got that
end-to-end tumble.
whenever possible
i inspected each car and climbed inside
in this crash
the car did exactly what it was designed to do it absorbed all of the impacts
on the outside of the car
and here on the inside especially in the passenger area
it's largely intact there is room at my head room at my sides room all around
there was room to live
if only the young girl riding here
had been buckled safely in the car.
what exactly does room to live mean?
the way cars are designed has changed they're built with what's called
crumple zones in any kind of a crash the front and back ends absorb the energy
created by impact
by compressing
in a rollover the ends compress the windshield often shatters
the sides of the car may bend in some but the occupant area is supposed to hold
up safety folks call this area the cage and for good reason
it is remarkably strong and if you're wearing your seatbelt it will hold you
inside. but this is what they're gearing for is protection of the occupants
fly out of that protective cage and there's nothing between you and the ground.
they don't get dumped in a pile right there
since the vehicle comes back up
and they get pitched out, pitched out on the high side
i have not come across a crash yet
where the people would've been
better off ejected
the state patrol was working this rollover crash just outside mankato
earlier this month
it appears as though the occupant was ejected
due to the vault or the rollover
the vehicle then appeared to have landed on the roadway
on top of the driver
in this car too
there is room to live if
only the driver had stayed in the car. that was true in every rollover
crash we investigated
every single one
this hummer didn't hold up well in a high-speed rollover
front and back ends literally sheared off but just look at the cage
that could have
protected the driver
for the driver who was not wearing seatbelts there may well have been
room to live
how about this pickup no seat belt for the driver he flew out the window
look at all of this room around me
the cab of this pickup is largely intact this is room to live
in faribault
we come to see one car but the owner of glenn's towing
don rasmussen
has got more for us than that
like a lot of experience -
i've been here for forty-some years so i've seen a lot of accidents. the wisdom that
comes with that
- alot of time friends will come look at the car
and say i told her she's supposed to wear her seatbelt - and not one
but two cars to show us
this is the first
a young mother died when the car rolled
and she was pitched out
but look if she'd stayed inside she probably wouldn't even have bumped her head
there's room to live. it is a short walk to the second car. same type situation
except it was a
straightaway road but he lost control
went in the ditch, flipped it over
couple times i'd say
the damage to the two cars is nearly identical
inside
there is plenty of room to live and guess what
this driver did. why?
he was wearing a seat belt
i saw no injuries at all, he was walking around there. and the contrast between
these two crashes
says it all
this one here was just a few days ago
so when you look at this and look at that what do you think?
if only
if only
buckle up
if only
two of the most painful words a family can utter
buckle up
two of the most powerful
brianna remer's family
has said them all - we always taught her
wear your seatbelt. this is what the inside of
brianna's car looks like
if if she had stayed seatbelted inside
she probably would've bumped her head but there
is plenty of room to live
instead she was thrown partway out the back window
and a car landed on top of her. one time is all it takes - i tell the kids you let your guard
down one time and messenger of misery will jump on your back -
only the misery is not your own. someday i wanted to walk her down the aisle
when she was getting married
not walk her down the aisle in a casket
if only - there is room to live -
she had buckled up
there's room to live - if only - room to live
any of them had - there's definitely room to live, room to live
i've often said that if people saw what i've seen
they'd wear a seatbelt everytime
now you've seen it
if you want more information on the importance of wearing seatbelts
go to myfox9.com and click on news then on to the investigators
i'm trish van pilsum
for the fox nine investigators
pretty powerful. can't disagree with that