Laws
Nebraska Law
Nebraska law applies to those who are 18 and over in the front seat of the vehicle. The initial fine for not wearing a safety belt is $25 and can be imposed on the driver and the passengers separately. The law also allows for damages collected by someone in a crash to be reduced for not using a safety belt. The Nebraska Department of Motor Vehicles provides the following websites for information about the Nebraska law about occupant restraint:
Newton’s Law
Isaac Newton never saw a car, but his first law of motion applies directly to the dynamics of a car crash. An object at rest tends to stay at rest and an object in motion tends to stay in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by another force.
The way this works in a car crash is that the vehicle occupant is moving along at the same pace as the car. When the car comes to an abrupt stop, unless the occupant has some kind of force acting upon him or her, such as a safety belt, he or she will keep moving forward at the same rate the car was traveling. A safety belt tethers an occupant’s body to the car so it slows and stops with the car. An unrestrained driver or passenger keeps going until he or she is stopped by another collision, such as with the steering wheel, the windshield, or the pavement outside the car’s window. The third collision that occurs is the small movement of organs within the human body that continue to move until they are stopped by the ribs or other parts of the body. In some cases, this small movement causes enough damage to actually cause death.
With human laws there is always the possibility of not being caught and therefore not having the law enforced. With physics, however, these laws work the same every time, whether you’re in the front seat or the back seat, or whether you’re ever observed by law enforcement.
Some websites with Physics basics:
