So, why use a rear facing car seat? In short, because it’s proven to be the safest way to travel in the event of a crash. Of course, we can have any multitude of crash types, but, typically the most catastrophic would be a frontal collision. With a forward-facing seat that uses a harness in a frontal collision, the harness would restrain the child’s torso to the car seat, with the energy of the incident therefore being absolutely focussed in the child’s neck. This isn’t typically a scenario that any of our bodies handle well, but the younger the person, the less ‘ready’ their body is to deal with this level of trauma, and it can result in catastrophic injury, or worse.
In the same crash scenario in a seat that is rear-facing, the same level of energy is still present, although the torso is not held back by the harness; it’s going to travel, essentially ‘as one’ with the shell of the car seat – that energy is then is diluted across the entirety of the child’s back, neck and head, massively reducing the force on any particular part of the anatomy.
From our recent visit to Sweden, we’ve compiled a short sequence of videos, asking the team at Axkid ‘why is it safer to travel rear facing?’
Click here to view our range of Extended Rear Facing Car Seats.
