I posted about this earlier, but I can't find it. I have some pictures. My son was coming home from work last night, and a deer ran in front of the car. Boy, are they stupid! It messed up the area by the driver's headlight, and the left side of the car. I checked the dash cam, and it shows he was going the speed limit, and there was barely a second between the appearance of the deer and the collision.

The passenger's air bag went off, but not my son's - driving the car. One thing I learned: the seat belts are good for just one use. Both of them are fully extended and no longer usable. I bet they each cost well over $100. If you've never had an air bag deploy, it's a stinky, cloudy mess.

 

Deer are stupid. I hit one in my Fit.

Did he have a passenger? I didn't think it deployed unless there was a person in the seat.

 

Yes, there was a passenger, but why didn't his bag fire?

Seat belts are good for one collision, only. Both seat belts are extended and locked. There's quite a collection of parts in the seat belt area - lots of controls. I've heard that after a collision, seat belts should be replaced, and I guess this is Honda's way of making sure that happens,

 

I'm guessing it had to do with the severity of the impact. When I got hit by a drunk driver on my passenger side my airbag went off but he hit me doing 50. This is only a guess as I have read that the air bag systems take into account vehicle speed, occupant weight, force of impact, brake/throttle position and other things. Why deploy the bag if it is not needed. The seat belts might have igniters in them that are a sort of back up to the mechanical locking mechanism. On impact a tiny explosion locks the tensioner in place.

There are companies that rebuild seat belts. Safety Restore or something like that is one of them.

I didn't get airbag or seat belt lock on my deer collision but it kinda ran into the side front quarter panel and it was a small deer.

 

Ouch!! That sucks.

 

Your son has a lot of bad luck in fits. He should get a different car. Sounds like he's ok otherwise so thankful for that.

Insurance won't cover a rental while his is getting fixed?

I had a close call a few months ago and captured it on my dash cam: Stoopid deer

 

The dash cam showed the actual collision - less than a second from seeing the deer to it hitting the car. And it shows that he was doing the speed limit.