Abstract
Keywords: bus, rollover process, severity
A severe rollover accident happened on 17.04.2005 in Switzerland, at the Grand St Bernard Pass. 27 occupants were on board. The superstructure of the tourist coach collapsed, 12 fatalities and 15 injuries (4 of them were in life danger) There was no technical reason of the accident, the bus left its lane, broke the side-rail and rolled down and finally fell into a precipice. The accident got wide publicity in Europe, some of the media news, reports [1] were used to analyse the accident in details. The police report - including the expert report - gave also useful information to the study [2] but it has to be mentioned the police reports generally have different view-points as a technical expert dealing with the passive safety of buses. (e.g. with the strength of the bus superstructure or with major injury mechanisms, etc.) The severity of a rollover accident may be specified on two different ways: one is based on the number of casualties (this way is mainly used by the public opinion) and the other which is more technical, evaluates the circumstances of the rollover (turn on side is less severe than rolling down into a precipice) At first glane this accident may be declared as a severe one using both criteria. But the question may be raised: should have been this accident so severe if the strength of the superstructure were strong enough? This question is discussed in this paper based on the in-depth analysis of the accident considering the effect of the required strength of the superstructure in the rollover process.