If a 2009 Chevy Malibu got in a head-on collision with a 1959 Chevrolet Bel Air, which car would emerge with the least amount of damage? At first glance, you’d expect an old tank like the Bel Air to obliterate the Malibu, right? But nothing could be further from the truth.
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As you’ll see in the video below, the Bel Air is destroyed in this dangerous head-on collision that was posted in 2009 on Consumer Reports’s YouTube channel and rediscovered by Kottke.
The light Malibu is much better at absorbing the shock of the impact, and the airbags deploy well ahead of the impact. The passengers will undoubtedly feel a jolt, but they’ll have a much better chance of surviving accidents.
While the recent advances in passenger safety are impressive, cars figure to only get safer in the coming years. In fact, Volvo has said that it wants to make a “death-proof” car by 2020, so the days when human beings suffered fatalities from car accidents on a mass basis may come to an end in the coming decades.
