Abstract

CORDOBA-RODRIGUEZ, O.; DEL CASTILLO-MUSSOT, M.; MONTEMAYOR-ALDRETE, J.  and  PEREZ, L.A.. Setting up divisions in transport vehicles as a safety measure to reduce cumulated neighbor inertial forces on passengers. Rev. mex. fís. E [online]. 2011, vol.57, n.1, pp.38-43. ISSN 1870-3542.

Frequently, humans and animals are densely confined during transportation processes in both small and large spaces (containers, subways, wagons, buses). Clearly when sudden braking or collisions unfortunately occur, passengers may suffer physical damages. Then in order to avoid injuries due to unexpected decelerations during transportation, we propose to build simple extra divisions to decrease cumulative pressures due to the inertial force on standing-up stacked passengers due to neighbor passengers. In order to avoid fractures, we measured maximum compression forces on young adult thoraxes and the corresponding thorax compression limit. For situations of high crowding of these passengers, we estimate the size of the compartments as function of the expected decelerations and speeds. Implementation of the proposed divisions is simple and economical.

Keywords : Interdisciplinary applications of physics; elastic properties; transportation.

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