Toyota Rear - Seat Centre Airbag

Occupant safety has been an issue for concern for a very long time now - ever since cars started managing decent enough speeds. All the way from crumple zones, impact bars to seat belts and Supplementary Restraint Systems (SRS) or Airbags major steps have been taken to ensure that in the event of an accident, occupants are well protected so that injuries get reduced to a minimum. As far as front seat occupants were concerned airbags in the dashboard were the biggest innovation to hit the automotive industry. Further research resulted in the invention of curtain airbags that extended beyond just the front rows to the rear seat occupants as well. While these saved from impact with the interiors of the car itself, certain situations saw rear seat occupants colliding with each other - especially in a side impact.

Well, Toyota now has the perfect solution in the form of the Rear-Seat Centre Airbag. The airbag is housed within a large console in between the two rear seats. In the event of a collision, the airbag is deployed from the top of the console - inflating between the two rear seat passengers. This forms a cushion between the occupants and avoids them colliding with each other. Toyota has confirmed that this innovation will be making its way to select models in their International portfolio soon and will follow on the rest of the range subsequently.