CASPER

Child Advanced Safety Project for European Roads

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 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'The objectives of CASPER are to reduce fatalities and injuries of children in traffic accidents. A badly injured child or a dead child is everything nobody can tolerate. Children are more and more often involved in all modes of transportations; they have no choice; they are bind to the adult careers, taking for granted that the adults will take good care of them. CASPER will address two main aspects: - on one hand, the improvement of the efficiency of child protection through the development of innovative tools, such as new sensors, dummies models and child human models, completed by test procedures in frontal and lateral configurations, with associated injury criteria, in order to provide to CRS manufacturers the possibility to develop and test their products at a lower cost, with new methods, and at a same guarantee of efficiency. - on another hand, the analysis of the reasons and consequences of misuse of child restraint systems and of the influence of the real conditions of transportation of children, as compared to the certification test procedures. The main deliverables will be the improvement of biomechanical behaviour of existing dummies associated to new measurements sensors, as well as dummies and child human numerical models, with improved test procedures, which will allow solving the issues for improvement of children protection. Reports on the conditions of use of child restraint systems and consequences in accidents, including campaigns of information will be made in order to solve the problem of children involved in traffic accidents. Seven European countries are involved in this Consortium, with 14 partners who all have a long experience in the field of child safety. They have complementary profiles and were chosen for their high level of competence as regards crash investigations, test performance, computer simulations, experience on dummies and instrumentation, injury biomechanics, computer modelling and virtual testing.'

Introduzione (Teaser)

Researchers in Europe have contributed to efforts focused on reducing injuries and fatalities of children in traffic accidents.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

The 'Child advanced safety project for European roads' (CASPER) project recognised that a comprehensive approach to stepping up child safety in road transport must involve public regulation, road-user education, road infrastructure, compatibility between vehicles, and active, passive and tertiary safety devices.

CASPER partners addressed many issues explored in related research projects which did not, however, consider children (e.g. adult occupants, biomechanics, injury tolerances, dummy and human body modelling and virtual simulations). It is therefore not surprising that there is a lack of child biomechanical data, and that existing regulations, test procedures and standards related to children are based on scaled-down adult data.

In light of these and other shortcomings, CASPER focused on improving child protection through the development of innovative tools for child restraint system (CRS) manufacturers to better develop and test their products. Project researchers also analysed the reasons for and consequences of CRS misuse, and the conditions of transportation of children.

Mobilising a significant body of Europe's scientific and business experts in the field of passive safety related to children, CASPER's 15 partners from 7 countries set out to use existing data related to injuries of children and to fill in the gaps where possible. Project results point to a number of serious issues in the transport of children, not least of which is the actual use of restraint systems by caretakers.

Particularly important project successes include the development and validation of an abdominal sensor for child dummies and, on the basis of physical accident reconstructions, an updated set of injury criteria for children. The latter will be published and integrated in test procedures.

From harmonising data collection and storage processes to proposing new protection criteria for application in test procedures, the EU-funded CASPER project has made important advances in the area of child transport and safety. The practical implementation of various project findings will undoubtedly serve to drive down fatalities and injuries sustained by children during road transportation.