European car safety testing body Euro-NCAP yesterday announced its latest batch of results. They came as great news for Volvo, Mazda, Renault and Mercedes, whose cars were all award five-out-of-five.Latest versions of the Volvo V70, Mazda 2, Renault Laguna and Mercedes C-class all scored five-out-of-five for adult passenger protection. Combining individual scores for adult passenger, child passenger and pedestrian protection, the Volvo V70 emerged safest of all, tallying 91 points. That was in spite of a problem with side airbag deployment on the Volvo which the manufacturer has promised it will recall cars to fix.The Mazda 2 becomes the eleventh supermini to score five-out-of-five for adult passenger protection, but it ranks second only to the Peugeot 207 once adult passenger protection, child passenger protection and pedestrian protection are factored in. It scored a commendable 89 points overall, to the Peugeot’s 91.A fault with the Mazda’s front airbags caused late detonation in its initial tests, but Euro-NCAP agreed to a retest after Mazda fixed the problem, and promised to recall all new Mazda 2s involved and carry out reparation work. Also tested in the latest batch were the Daihatsu Materia and Honda Civic, which both scored four stars for adult passenger protection.
The all-time NCAP top four
Only four cars have ever scored 95 points or above since Euro-NCAP’s three-tier crash tests began; both the Honda Legend and Nissan Qashqai scored 95, while the Citroen C4 scored a very impressive 99.The safest new car on the road, according to the body, is the Citroen C6, which scored a record 100 points, its pop-up bonnet arming it for a four-star performance in the pedestrian protection tests.Test results for every car tested to date are available at http://www.euroncap.com/.
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