[cmcaleer]

Personally I rather die than kill a child, and SUVs are far worse in that regard. Despite making up 15% of accidents in this[1] study, they represent 25% of fatal accidents. A child is 8 times more likely to die if struck by an SUV according to the same study. Empirically, SUV front blind spots are crazy and if you have a young child ask them to stand in front of your car with measuring tape while you’re in it. Very easy to imagine pulling out without seeing them and crushing them to death. The problem is even worse if you have a short partner. I felt blind when I drove my dad’s.

Even if we go for the selfish perspective, rollover rates for SUVs are intrinsically higher, and it looks like the Hilux in particular hasn’t bothered fixing this design flaw in 9 years[2]. And that additional braking distance can be the difference between a massive headache from rear ending, or worse.

Driving defensively will increase your odds of survival per mile far more than any additional metal will.

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00224...

[2] https://youtu.be/xoHbn8-ROiQ

[orwin]

And also, only 5% of all accidents are two rolling cars collisions, and a not small part of that are parking collision.

The average number of death per km was decreasing until covid in Europe and countries that did not buy into the SUV trends, but started increasing in the US in the early 2010s and correlate with the percentage of SUVs.