You can think that old cars are more resistant in case of impact, but the truth is that modern vehicles provide better protection to their occupants. Many times we have heard that older cars are safer because they resist better in an accident or road accident, or the typical explanation that new cars "fall apart" in any collision and therefore are not reliable if we compare them.

But a study carried out by the National Association of Traffic Administration and Traffic Safety in the United States (NHTSA) shows figures that allow us to realize that fatalities in road accidents increase proportionally to the age of the vehicles involved, denying popular thinking. Recently we can see that recent batch vehicles include very interesting driving assistance systems that prevent many accidents caused mainly by human error, such as emergency braking assistants or lane abandonment alerts, among many others.

But regardless of the new technologies included in recent models, with very interesting driving assistance, modern vehicles present a revised work at the structural level that allows absorbing impacts and dispersing kinetic energy, preventing it from entering the cabin and hurting to the occupants

Using the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) generated by the same association, during the period from 2012 to 2016 (the most recent), the relationship between the age of the vehicles can be observed involved with the severity of fatal injuries in passengers, going from 27 percent for cars categorized within the age group of 0 to 3 years, up to 50 percent in those in the age group of cars 18 years and older.

So the popular view that older cars resist better against a crash could be true, however, the consequences for their occupants are not and precisely because the new cars are developed to get rid of the cost of protecting their occupants. The NHTSA recommends that when deciding to change vehicles, the safety they provide to be less likely to suffer accidents with fatal consequences be taken into account.