Cupra FORMENTOR 2024 - Page 49

Safety
47
Seat belts
Fig.18 Instrument cluster: indication of the
status of the rear seat seat belts.
When the ignition is switched on, the status
display of the belts ›››Fig.18 informs the
driver on the instrument panel display whether
the occupants of the rear seats have their seat
belts fastened.
Depending on seat occupancy and the status
of the seat belts, the vehicle's seats will light up
in dierent colours:
A white light indicates that the corre-
sponding seat is not occupied.
A green light indicates that the seat’s oc-
cupant is wearing the seat belt.
A red light indicates that the seat is occu-
pied and the occupant is not wearing the
seat belt.
If a speed of 25km/h (15mph) is exceeded
after moving o without the driver or a front
passenger seatbelt being fastened, or if the
seatbelt is unfastened while driving, an audible
signal will sound for 126 seconds. In addition,
the warning lamp on the instrument cluster
display ashes.
The lamp goes out when the ignition is
on and all occupants have fastened their seat
belts.
Head-on collisions and the laws of
physics
Fig.19 A driver not wearing a seat belt
may be thrown forward violently.
Fig.20
Any rear seat occupants not
wearing a seat belt may be thrown forward
violently, hitting the driver who is wearing
the seat belt.
The eects of the laws of physics in the case
of a head-on collision are easy to explain: the
moment a vehicle starts moving, a type of en-
ergy called “kinetic energy” starts acting on
both the vehicle and its passengers.
The amount of “kinetic energy” depends on
the speed of the vehicle and on the weight of
the vehicle and of its passengers. The higher
they are, the more energy there is to be “ab-
sorbed” in the event of an accident.
The most signicant factor, however, is the
speed of the vehicle. If the speed doubles from
25 km/h (15mph) to 50 km/h (30mph), for
example, the corresponding kinetic energy is
multiplied by four.