Slashdot Mirror
Rescuers Prep for Hybrid Car Accidents
mykepredko writes "I've driven a Toyota Prius for two years now and found this CNN article regarding the training required to rescue people trapped in hybrid cars to be slightly alarming. As an EE, I would expect that the electrical system is designed to be as well protected and fail-safe as possible in an accident, but if I'm ever in an accident, I'll make sure that any responders are wearing rubber gloves and boots and if any cutting is done, the roof is the only area they touch." Toyota has an accident guide indicating that if the airbags deploy, the hybrid battery pack should be automatically isolated.
If you are in an accident bad enough to need "responders" to get you out, odds are not great that you'll be conscious.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
if any cutting is done, the roof is the only area they touch.
And if the car is upside down?
Racing cars have a standard placed cut off for the motor/fuel line inside the drivers door for rescuers, why not something like that for the hybrids?
Trolling is a art,
My dad has a Civic Hybrid. All the necessary cabling runs under the car next to the frame rails. If rescuers are haveing to cut that deep, you're SOL anyways. Normally rescuers have to use the jaws of life on doors, and the associated A,B,C pillars. No electricals go thru there, other than side airbag sensors.
Sounds like another internet scare article put out by a 'reputible' source...
Judging by the size of the hybrids that I've seen, I doubt that after being hit by any of the overly large gas guzzling SUV's on the road today, there will be much car to actually cut.
The problem with these things isn't the danger of electricity, it's the danger of being under my suburban!
Certainly every man at his best state is but vapor
Yes, but the people tend to be alive after these accidents. Anyone can yank a corpse out of a mangled Honda. Believe me, anyone!
You see a lot of panicy stuff about how dangerous
all that electrical energy in the batteries is,
but when it comes down to it if the car has the
same range as a similar normal car then there is
exactly the same amount of energy in the batteries
as there would normally be in a car's fuel tank.
But these aren't pure electric cars. They only
have a few km of range on the batteries and most
of the energy is in the fuel tank just like any
other car.
"Concerns about hybrids are increasing in large part because of their growing popularity."
Obviously, somebody in the industry hasn't done his homework preparing for the new millenium and is trying to save himself through using his connection in the cable networks. What really bothers me is how they are using the innermost concerns of people to plant them in a world of fear. They almost make it unpatriotic to buy hybrids as thus you are endangering the heroic rescuers besides yourself. Not that CNN really surprises me with this move. I've lost all faith in their capability as any kind of source of information.
In nice weather, I roll the windows down. I can hear a bycycle aproach and not slow down for the stop sign while riding on the left side of the road. Making extra noise at the stop sign would keep me from hearing the cyclists that don't stop for stop signs assuming that I saw them before pulling out in front of them. They need to add the noise and bright lights to bycycles (like a harley) so they can be seen and heard. I usualy do see a bicycle at at an intersection IF they come up to the intersection in the proper lane and stop for the stop sign. That's not the cyclist I pull out in front of because I didn't see them. It's the ones on the other side of the road that didn't stop that don't get seen. A pedesterian gets seen because he is at the corner when the driver looks checking trafic, not 35 feet back from the corner traveling 30 MPH into the intersection.
The truth shall set you free!