A good vid on why seatbelts save lives

[dannyboy]

While a different vehicle, if you watch what happens to the pilot in slow motion, he was outside of the chopper for a large part of the violence. He then was slammed into the front of the chopper, then the rear, so hard that it broke the seat. Within 1/10 of a second, had he not been wearing the belt, he would have been thrown into the blades.

I know this thread will bring howls of "everyone wears seatbelts while in a package or feeder.......". I have seen many that do not, ever.

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PhotoBlog - Helicopter crashes installing Christmas tree in Auckland

 

[TheDick]

Nice vid, pretty heliflopper. Dude that guys luck ran out!
Yeah seatbelts rock!
One center manager told us even if ur gonna move it five feet, buckle up- if you fall out it could roll squish you like a bug!
Ok he didnt say exactly like that but you get the jist.
Say the "keep out zone" for choppas is five times the size?
Any heli pilots agree?

 

[dannyboy]

Dude that guys luck ran out

Actually, a crash like that, and you walk away from it, and you think the guys luck ran out? Ten bucks says that he would disagree.......

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[Bubblehead]

Notice how it didn't have a lap belt like some of the package cars in our fleet, nor did it have a low back seat?
A co-worker asked an intriguing question to our center manager the other day.
He asked why his life was less valuable than the next guys in relation to him being assigned an old P1000 with no power steering, a lap belt seatbelt, and low back seat while most had a newer vehicle with improved safety features?
Instead of these upgrades, the company deemed it more prudent to install $900 worth of sensors in the same vehicles that were obviously outdated and antiquated.
The center manager's reply? we're still waiting.....

 

[dannyboy]

You are totally correct. He spent the majority of the time with his head and torso outside of the chopper cabin. THen ended up on the opposite side and the back of the seat had given away. Had the chopper rolled while he was outside, the story would have been different.

Talk about the instant violence though, to the guy.

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[barnyard]

We had a couple of drivers that were buckling there seatbelts across the seat but not wearing them. They were caught by telematics, according to the report, they never took the belt off, so it flagged them.

My daughter was in an accident a couple of years ago where the seat belt had not been latched and popped open when she was hit. She was ejected and the vehicle rolled on her, but she went back in a window that was already broken out. Thankfully, she was only severely injured. It could have ended very differently.

I know of 2 UPS driver fatalities in my region where the driver was not wearing their seatbelt.