Six Airbags Featured as Standard

Safety Equipment in the new MINI

The new MINI offers not only particularly safe driving behaviour, but also a wide range of special features for optimum protection of the car's occupants. Indeed, this combination of numerous safety features is based largely on the results of practical accident research by the BMW Group and goes beyond the obvious fulfilment of all safety standards required by law the world over.

As a result, the safety package featured by the new MINI offers everything needed for optimum fulfilment of all relevant crash tests. And yet a further point is that the engineers developing the new MINI considered not only current, but also future standards and legislation, for example in the interest of pedestrians and their protection.



Curtain airbags also protecting the passengers at the rear

Both the new MINI Cooper and the new MINI Cooper S come as standard with no less than six airbags - frontal, side and curtain/head airbags for both the driver and front passenger.

The airbags inflate as a function of the type and severity of an accident determined by means of sensors and calculated by the central computer. The two side airbags are integrated in the outer side supports on the front seat backrests, effectively protecting the driver and front passenger from thorax injury. The curtain/head airbags, in turn, are integrated in the roof lining and inflate when required as extra-large curtains offering not only the passengers at the front, but also the rear-seat passengers optimum protection from head injury.

Three-point safety belts are naturally fitted on all four seats, the front belts being equipped additionally with belt latch tensioners and belt force limiters.

Fitted crosswise at the front, the engine also helps to give the new MINI optimum crash behaviour. Indeed, the entire structure of the body and the choice of materials serve to keep the passenger compartment free of impact energy, wide energy-absorbing zones preventing objects from entering the footwells. Highly stable crossbars, in turn, also help to give the car's occupants effective safety and protection at all times.

The electrical fuel pump is automatically cut off in a severe collision, the central locking is opened and both the interior lights as well as the hazard warning flashers are activated. So in terms of both the overall concept and all the individual features and details, the safety system featured in the new MINI meets all the demands made of a premium car.

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