Why ride rear-facing?

Sitting rear-facing is simply the safest way to sit in a car. Research shows that the risk of small children being killed or seriously injured is five times higher for those sitting in forward-facing seats than for those in rear-facing. New data demonstrates that in a side-impact crash (the most deadly type of collision) rear-facing kids are 4 times safer than those riding forward facing.

According to the laws of physics, in a crash you always go to the point of the impact. Therefore, in a frontal crash, everyone moves toward the front of the car. If you are forward-facing--either in a car-seat or a safety belt--your upper body stops quickly as the chest strap on the car seat or seat belt holds you back. However, your head doesn't stop as quickly, but rather travels all the way forward until your chin touches your chest, and then goes all the way back, in the whiplash motion.

Although you'd feel uncomfortable, as an adult you can physically withstand the whiplash motion. Because the head pulls away from the body so violently, having a smaller head in proportion to body makes the effects of whiplash less severe. An adults head is a small percentage of its body--only 6%.

It's quite different for a newborn baby, whose head is a whopping 25% of its body. This means that if a newborn were forward facing in a frontal crash, their head would pull forward with four times as much force as would an adult's!

Strength and rigidity of ligaments and bones in the spine also contribute to an ability to tolerate the whiplash motion. The bones of an infant's spine are made up of soft, stretchy cartilage, the same thing that makes your ears and nose flexible. The ligaments that connect these cartilagenous bones are also underdeveloped and strechy. Scientists have found that a newborn's spinal column (bones + ligaments) can stretch up to 2 inches, whereas the spinal cord inside can stretch only 1/4 of an inch. If the spinal cord is forced to stretch more than it can, it breaks, leaving the baby paralyzed or worse.