In the past twenty years hundreds of infants and young children have died after being left in vehicles, usually by accident. When turning the vehicle off, drivers of the Atlas are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The XC90 doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
Both the Atlas and the XC90 have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, side-impact head airbags, front seatbelt pretensioners, height adjustable front shoulder belts, plastic fuel tanks, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, post-collision automatic braking systems, daytime running lights, lane departure warning systems, blind spot warning systems, rearview cameras, rear cross-path warning, available all wheel drive and around view monitors.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration does side impact tests on new vehicles. In this test, which crashes the vehicle into a flat barrier at 38.5 MPH, results indicate that the Volkswagen Atlas is safer than the Volvo XC90:
|
Atlas |
XC90 |
|
Front Seat |
|
STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
Chest Movement |
.5 inches |
.7 inches |
Abdominal Force |
48 lbs. |
153 lbs. |
|
Rear Seat |
|
STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
Spine Acceleration |
39 G’s |
40 G’s |
Hip Force |
527 lbs. |
608 lbs. |
New test not comparable to pre-2011 test results. More stars = Better. Lower test results = Better.
Side impacts caused 23% of all road fatalities in 2018, down from 29% in 2003, when the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety introduced its side barrier test. In order to continue improving vehicle safety, the IIHS has started using a more severe side impact test: 37 MPH (up from 31 MPH), with a 4180-pound barrier (up from 3300 pounds). The results of this newly developed test demonstrates that the Volkswagen Atlas is safer than the XC90:
|
Atlas |
XC90 |
Overall Evaluation |
GOOD |
GOOD |
Structure |
GOOD |
GOOD |
|
Driver Injury Measures |
|
Head/Neck |
GOOD |
GOOD |
Head Injury Criterion |
42 |
123 |
Neck Tension |
156 lbs. |
245 lbs. |
Torso |
GOOD |
ACCEPTABLE |
Shoulder Deflection |
.83 in |
.91 in |
Torso Max Deflection |
1.1 in |
1.42 in |
Torso Deflection Rate |
4 MPH |
7 MPH |
Head Protection |
GOOD |
GOOD |
|
Passenger Injury Measures |
|
Head/Neck |
GOOD |
GOOD |
Torso |
GOOD |
ACCEPTABLE |
Shoulder Deflection |
.43 in |
1.38 in |
Shoulder Force |
178 lbs. |
290 lbs. |
Pelvis |
GOOD |
ACCEPTABLE |
Pelvis Force |
848 lbs. |
915 lbs. |
Head Protection |
GOOD |
GOOD |
Instrumented handling tests conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and analysis of its dimensions indicate that the Atlas is .8% to 5.5% less likely to roll over than the XC90.