VOLVO’S LEADING SAFETY INVENTION CELEBRATES ITS 50th ANNIVERSARY

This year marks 50 years since Volvo first introduced the three-point safety belt, an invention that has saved more lives in traffic than any other technical feature.

"Following its invention, Volvo immediately gave free use of its patent to all manufacturers and today the safety belt is a natural feature in virtually all trucks and cars. That is why we can say that there is a bit of Volvo in every vehicle on the road - irrespective of make and model," said Volvo Trucks' traffic and product safety director, Carl Johan Almqvist.

Although the three-point belt has been around for half a century, its use is still worryingly low among truck drivers in some countries. For example, on Swedish roads, only four out of ten truck drivers use the belt, while France, owing to tough legislation, has recently boosted safety belt use to 80 per cent.
The consequences of not using the belt are well documented in Volvo Trucks' own accident research. For example, of 15 truck driver fatalities on Swedish roads over the past three years, only one driver was wearing a safety belt.
"The human being does not have a built-in speedometer, so we do not perceive speed as dangerous, especially not when we sit high up in a large vehicle," said Almqvist.
"On a global perspective, a large number of drivers die every year while not wearing a safety belt and their lives might have been saved by the truck's most obvious safety feature. This is something we must rectify in a challenge that is as big as the development of new technologies for accident avoidance."

The world's first vehicle with a three-point safety belt fitted as standard was a Volvo PV544, delivered in Karlstad, Sweden on August 13th 1959.

– Jim Robinson

Comments

[Andy]

I feel the best way to rectify the issue is let natural selection take its course. Eventually all people who refuse to ware the belt would be killed off; according to the research statistics anyway.

[Coach handbags]

Awesome article! Paints nice pictures – I think I wander by next time, I’ll check it out!