Real accidents involving vulnerable road users: in-depth investigation, numerical simulation and experimental reconstitution with PMHS

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Abstract
This paper presents the methodology used to improve knowledge about vulnerable road users’ accidents and more specifically pedestrians or cyclists. This work is based on a complete analysis of real accidents from three different approaches: in-depth accident investigation, numerical simulation with multibody model and experimental reconstitution with PMHS subject. Accidents chosen from an in-depth multidisciplinary investigation are numerically modelled using a multibody software. Then, a parametric study focused for instance on car velocity and victim position at impact is performed in order to find the best correlations with all indications produced by the in-depth analysis. Finally, the retained configuration close to the presumed real accident conditions is reproduced experimentally by a crash test using cadavers. All results are finally compared in order to validate the real accident reconstruction. This methodology is applied on two real accidents involving one pedestrian or one cyclist.