The all-new Ford Kuga* SUV has been awarded the highest-possible 5-star safety rating by the Euro NCAP independent crash test authority, scoring 92 per cent for adult protection and receiving full points in both the side barrier and the more severe side pole impact tests.
Kuga’s structure utilises high-strength steel throughout the skeleton and intelligent designs to improve impact protection, including ultra-high-strength 3D-rolled steel tubes incorporated into each A-pillar and along the rooflines.
Additional Ford Co-Pilot360 technologies** designed to help Kuga drivers avoid accidents and distraction include:
- Ford’s Pre-Collision Assist with Pedestrian and Cyclist Detection technology, introducing new Intersection functionality for the first time in Europe that can automatically apply the brakes to avoid or mitigate the effects of accidents if the driver is turning across the path of oncoming traffic and the system determines an imminent collision
- Lane-Keeping System with Road Edge Detection, which supports the driver to safely guide the vehicle back into the correct lane or away from a soft verge, a gravel shoulder or grass at the side of a road by gently applying torque to the steering wheel
- Lane-Keeping System with Blind Spot Assist, which combines Ford’s Blind Spot Information System (BLIS) and Lane-Keeping System to monitor the driver’s blind spot for vehicles approaching from behind on multi-lane carriageways. If a driver either signals a lane change, or the control system senses a lane change when a vehicle is approaching in the blind spot, counter-steering is applied to warn the drive and discourage the manoeuvre, another first for Ford vehicles in Europe
- Cross Traffic Alert, which warns drivers reversing out of a parking space of vehicles that may soon be crossing behind them. The system can apply the brakes to avoid or mitigate the effects of collisions if drivers do not respond to warnings
- Evasive Steering Assist, designed to operate at city and motorway speeds and using radar and a camera to detect slower-moving and stationary vehicles ahead and provide steering support to enable drivers to manoeuvre around a vehicle if a collision is imminent
- Wrong Way Alert, which uses a windscreen mounted camera and information from the car’s navigation system to provide drivers with audible and visual warnings when driving through two “No Entry” signs on a motorway ramp
- Ford’s Adaptive Front Lighting System with predictive curve light and sign-based light, which pre-adjusts headlamp patterns for maximum visibility at curves, junctions or roundabouts
Should an accident occur, new Post-Collision Braking technology helps to reduce the impact of a potential secondary collision by automatically applying moderate brake pressure when an initial collision event is detected; slowing the vehicle can potentially lessen injury to occupants and further damage to the vehicle.
Child protection in the all-new Ford Kuga also was highly rated, receiving a score of 86 per cent. Last month, the all-new Ford Explorer Plug-In Hybrid*** seven-seat SUV also received the maximum 5-star safety rating from Euro NCAP, the first Ford electrified vehicle to do so under the new, more stringent protocols introduced last year.
SOURCE: Ford Motor Company
