Video: BMW Rollover Crash Test Facility

In America, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration sets guidelines in order to make sure that the cars on the road are safe — or at least can keep the passengers safe during a road accident. Thus, they enforce really strict rules and require cars to undergo a series of crash tests including the ones for rollover crashes. Some automakers rely on the NHTSA for the tests but BMW takes it very seriously. In fact, the German Automaker has built their very own vehicle crash testing facility. Check out the BMW Rollover Crash Test Facility on this video:

BMW goes above and beyond to ensure the safety of their customers by performing rollover safety crash tests on their cars. The standards they set on this facility are actually even higher than what the United States National Highway Traffic Safety Administration would require. That’s how much BMW cares about the drivers and passengers of the cars they produce.

The video above shows three individual tests that a BMW car is subjected to before it ever gets approved for production. The initial test replicates the conditions that would ultimately lead to ramp-induced rollover, more commonly known in the industry as the ‘corkscrew’ test. The second test is the sand pit test that simulates what can happen when a vehicle slides sideways off the road and ends up rolling on its side and eventually on the roof. Last is the embankment test that tries to replicate the car’s trajectory when going off the road into a ditch or a steep downhill.

Though the subject of the video is a BMW X6, all technologies shown here are currently available on all BMW models.