Six Star Magazine Six Star Magazine Spring 2015 | Page 11

SU B A R U SA F ET Y

Subaru and the IIHS
by Roderick Crawford
PHOTOS CO URT E SY OF T HE IIHS

These days, a question more and more prospective car buyers are asking is: “Just how safe is this new car?”
So it’s reassuring to know that Subaru has long been at the forefront of automotive safety, crash-testing
vehicles before the same tests were ever conducted by regulatory organizations. This vast experience is
reflected in how well Subaru vehicles perform in modern crash tests: Subaru is the only manufacturer to
have every vehicle in its line-up name a TOP SAFETY PICK by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety
(IIHS) for six consecutive years (2010-2015).

The IIHS is a U.S.-based, non-profit organization that has
become the gold standard of car safety certification. But this raises
some questions: Where did the organization come from, how did it
become so respected and how is its testing conducted?
Founded in 1959 and funded by automobile insurance companies,

Officer at IIHS. “But IIHS testing goes beyond those baseline
safety requirements.”
According to Zuby, the IIHS tries to encourage automakers to
develop technology to help protect drivers in crashes that happen
in the real world—crashes that currently aren’t represented by

the IIHS is based in Arlington, Virginia. While it conducts research

regulatory standards. In his 22-plus years at the IIHS, Zuby has seen

on road design and traffic regulations, as well as certain consumer

his organization develop and implement a string of innovative crash

products such as child car booster seats, the IIHS is best known as

tests that have helped make new vehicles safer than ever before.

the benchmark for new passenger vehicle crash testing.
“All new cars and trucks sold in North America are required

The first groundbreaking crash test conducted by the IIHS was
the moderate overlap test introduced in 1995; this was the first test

to pass some form of government-mandated safety regulations,”

in the U.S. to deal with offset instead of head-on collisions. The

says David Zuby, the Executive Vice President and Chief Research

test sees 40 per cent of the front of a vehicle exposed at impact

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