What is the Safest Small SUV?
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: Let's check and see just how tough some sports utility vehicles really are. There is some testing being done by a highway safety group, which has updated its crash test results on small SUVs. And the best performer on this list may actually surprise you. CNN's Eileen O'Connor joins us now live from the testing facility of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. That is in Ruckersville, Virginia. Good morning, Eileen.</s>EILEEN O'CONNOR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Leon. Well, the institute has done three tests on three new small utility vehicles: the Toyota Rav4, which is a redesign of that car; the Ford Escape, brand new car by Ford; and the Hyundai Santa Fe. And with me is David Zuby, who is the vice president of the institute. This is a new car, isn't it?</s>DAVID ZUBY, VICE PRESIDENT, INSURANCE INST.: That's right. The Santa Fe is a new model for Hyundai this year.</s>O'CONNOR: And this turned out to be the best. But what kind of test did you do?</s>ZUBY: Well, all of the cars are subjected what we call a 40 mile-per-hour, 40 percent offset frontal crash test. What that means is that the front of the car crashes into a barrier, where only the left part of the front of the car engages the barrier. So the structure in the left part of the car has got to manage all of the energy for the crash.</s>O'CONNOR: OK, and why -- it turns out -- and this is surprising -- that the Hyundai was in fact the safest, although it's the cheapest, the least expensive of these three cars. What makes it the best?</s>ZUBY: Well, what makes it is the best is that the area around where the driver sits is pretty well preserved. There's a little bit of deformation, but plenty of room to survive the crash. Also, the dummy that was sitting in the driver's seat measured low forces, indicating that the risk of serious injury was pretty low in this crash.</s>O'CONNOR: OK. Now, let's walk over here to the Ford Escape, which actually turned out to have the least favorable rating of these three. And, as it turned out, this was a marginal rating. That got a good rating. This got a marginal rating. Why was that?</s>ZUBY: Well, in comparison to the Hyundai Sante Fe, you can see that the area around the driver is considerably more crunched up, meaning that parts of the car are coming in and closing in around the driver. We measured high forces on the dummy's right leg and moderately high forces on the dummy's head when his head pushed through the air bag and hit the steering wheel and then bounced back and hit the b-pillar here -- so although not really high risk of serious injury, a moderately high risk of injury for the head and a very high risk of injury for the right leg in this crash.</s>O'CONNOR: And you can really see that the gas pedal is pushed actually pretty far forward. And, in fact, there is a lot of damage to the floorboards under wear the driver would sit. Now, our third car is the Toyota Rav4. And this got an acceptable rating, correct?</s>ZUBY: That's right. This is acceptable overall -- no big problems here like super high forces on the right leg that we saw in the Escape, but some -- a lot of things that weren't quite good. So in the end, it ends up only acceptable overall.</s>O'CONNOR: But it was actually better than some of the other 10 -- you've actually tested about 10 of these small utility vehicles.</s>ZUBY: That's correct. Compared to some of the other 10, this is a pretty good performer with an acceptable overall rating -- a little bit more intrusion than we saw in the Santa Fe, a little bit higher forces on the dummy, but still a pretty good performer.</s>O'CONNOR: And, Leon, it's really surprising -- is that, again, comparing it to the other 10 that they've arrested -- they've tested -- the Hyundai Sante Fe actually also turns out to be better than the Subaru Forester. So, as it turns out, you know, cheaper isn't always bad. This actually turns out to be safer -- Leon</s>HARRIS: Interesting. Eileen, just one last -- I have got to ask you this one question, because I've always wondered about these testing facilities. After they wreck a car, what do they do with it? Do they sell it for parts or what?</s>O'CONNOR: You know what they do? Well, David, we were just talking about that. Now, what happens to the cars afterwards?</s>ZUBY: Well, after we have finished all the studying that we do with the cars, we eventually sell them to auto salvagers. Auto salvagers typically take the cars apart. And the parts that are still good get sold for -- as used parts. And then the rest of the scrap -- the stuff that is crunched up -- is just sold as scrap metal.</s>O'CONNOR: So we could get you some deep, deep discounts here, Leon, on your next car.</s>HARRIS: Thanks, but no thanks. Eileen O'Connor, reporting live this morning from Ruckersville, Virginia, thanks much. TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com