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Watch 17 years of crash-protection advancement in one video

Smashing an old car into a new one is a great way to see just how much safer new cars can be.

Andrew Krok Reviews Editor / Cars
Cars are Andrew's jam, as is strawberry. After spending years as a regular ol' car fanatic, he started working his way through the echelons of the automotive industry, starting out as social-media director of a small European-focused garage outside of Chicago. From there, he moved to the editorial side, penning several written features in Total 911 Magazine before becoming a full-time auto writer, first for a local Chicago outlet and then for CNET Cars.
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Andrew Krok

If you look at a car from 2012, it's clear that the auto industry has made plenty of advancements over the past five years. Look back to 1998, and you'll wonder how human beings even survived to this point.

To illustrate just how far crash-protection tech has some since the turn of the century, the Australasian New Car Assessment Program (ANCAP) brought two cars together -- literally, and violently. It crashed a 1998 Toyota Corolla into a 2015 Toyota Corolla, and the result is just as jarring as you think it would be.

According to ANCAP's data, people are twice as likely to die in a crash if the car in which they're travelling was built before 2000. Looking at how much damage the 1998 Corolla takes in comparison to its newer variant, that statistic sounds about right.

The late-model Corolla in the video wasn't always known as a Toyota Corolla in the US. It originally came to the US as the Scion iM, a rebadged version of the Japanese-market Toyota Auris hatchback. But since Scion kicked the bucket, it's now sold in the US as the Toyota Corolla iM.

(Hat tip to Jalopnik!)