New Insight From GM Safety

Gay Kent, the General Motors Executive Director of Vehicle Safety and
Crashworthiness recently gave an interview about her insights about the
safety policies and new vehicle safety technologies that are an
important part of the quality customers can expect from GM vehicles. She
is excited to be talking about all the great things about GM’s
commitment to safety.

Many vehicle manufacturers focus only on the
prevention of accidents or keeping customers safe during a crash, but
not both. GM is committed to bringing safe conditions for their vehicles
no matter what the circumstances. The focus of GM’s safety initiatives
are on continuous protection, before, during, and after a crash. Gm has
recently introduced the new safety cameras in the Terrain as well as the
first front-center airbag which will be unveiled in GM’s 2013 model
vehicles. This commitment to safety is applied to vehicles across the
globe. There are many different safety requirements in vehicles for
different parts of the world and GM is committed to making their
vehicles as safe as possible no matter what area of the world their cars
are being sent to.

According to Kent, GM always includes federal
safety regulations in the design of their vehicles from the beginning.
Safety is one of GM’s top priorities for their vehicles. GM employs the
safety regulations set forth by federal institutions, but in addition to
that GM also has their own safety standards, which often go above and
beyond their legal obligations to safety.

Kent also said that GM
is focused on customers. It is that kind of focus that led them to
develop safety measures that go above and beyond the top safety
regulations at the federal level. Because of crash data that was
gathered over several studies GM realized that new technology like the
front center airbag would reduce certain injuries and fatalities
associated with particular types of crashes. It was GM’s commitment to
reducing fatalities and injuries that led them to develop this kind of
airbag.

Kent also says that GM’s partner in safety, the system
supplier Takata, had an equal role in the development of the new front
center airbag. Both companies were working on this safety technology
individually, and then joined together to create the technology faster
and more efficient than they would have on their own. Together the two
companies brought this new airbag to the world years earlier than it
might have been if it had been developed by an individual company.

Kent
also talked about the importance of the new safety camera in the
Terrain. She says that the new camera is designed to help prevent
crashes, so that GM can try to stop the problem before it starts. This
new camera is unique in that it is able to offer the same technology
that other companies have been working on, except that GM’s version uses
only one camera whereas many other company’s safety systems require the
use of multiple cameras. Kent also explained that GM wants to make this
camera available to everyone by offering it on a broad range of
vehicles of varying prices.

And Kent also wanted customers to know
that these two new developments are part of GM’s long running history
of commitment to safety. These new safety technologies are industry
firsts, and they are not unlike previous firsts in auto safety that have
been developed by GM. For example, GM was actually the first to develop
a very lifelike crash test dummy and remains the standard crash test
dummy industry wide to this day.

Overall GM remains committed to the highest level of safety
possible in their vehicles. Scott McCorkle and GM want customers to
know that their vehicle have been through rigorous testing and are made
for safe driving. These vehicles are designed with customer safety in mind and are some of the safest vehicles on the market today!