Traffic Collision Reconstruction
Traffic collision reconstruction involves applying principles of dynamics, perception and general physics to the movements of vehicles, bodies and other objects during and after collision. From a properly done analysis, speeds, positions of vehicles and passengers, and driver responses that led to the accident and/or took place at impact and post-impact can be determined. Additionally, analysis performed from available evidence can be used to determine mechanical failure of critical vehicle components -- such as steering, brakes, suspension systems and tires, which could have been the cause or a contributing factor to the accident .
Accident and Crash Defined
Accident: Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1992, at p. 8, defines an accident as "an undesirable or unfortunate happening, unintentionally caused and usually resulting in harm, injury damage or loss; casualty; mishap: automobile accidents."
Crash: The U.S. National Safety Council defines crash as “That occurrence in a sequence of events which usually produces unintended injury, death or property damage.
Through the influence of traffic accident investigators, the news media, traffic engineering, profession-related textbooks, and schools for the investigation of vehicle accidents, the meaning of the word accident given by Webster has been modified as it applies to mishaps involving vehicles and pedestrians. Contemporary usage in this sense implies that harm, injury, damage and/or loss usually results from an unfortunate happening, whether unintentional or intentional, that is part of a series or sequence of events.
For the purposes of traffic accident investigation and reconstruction, the term traffic accident is defined as follows:
"That occurrence in a series of events which usually produces injury, death or property damage."
The term traffic accident is generally considered to be synonymous with the terms accident, collision, crash, incident or any other applicable such term used in various jurisdictions and in many published works.
Therefore, generally speaking, for the purposes of traffic accident, collision or crash investigation issues, the terms “accident, “collision”, and “crash” may be considered synonymous.
Reconstruction Defined
"Reconstruction," the late J. Stannard Baker wrote, "is not so much a matter of collecting information as it is of thinking about information which has been collected. Reconstructing an accident is like assembling a jigsaw puzzle to see what the picture or, at least part of it, looks like. The thinking required is essentially a disciplined and purposeful study of available data, always with two quite different ideas kept in mind:
- the issues to be resolved, and
- the principles of basic sciences to be applied.
Reconstruction Process
Traffic accident reconstruction is an advanced level of investigation that starts with investigation and evidence gathering at the scene and continues until the objectives of traffic accident investigation and reconstruction have been satisfied. In addition, reconstruction includes, interpretation of evidence, whether gathered by the reconstructionist or another investigator, and arriving at conclusions based on sound, scientific analysis of all available evidence.