We intuitively know that there are often tremendous forces involved in a vehicle collision. This paper will briefly examine some of the pertinent physics principles and discuss equivalent collisions.
Kinetic energy is the energy an object possesses when it's moving.
For example, a 2000 pound car going 65 MPH has slightly more than 283,000 ft-lbs of energy. To put that in perspective, if all that kinetic energy were converted to heat, it would boil a quart of water. During a normal, non-collision stop most of the energy is absorbed in the brake system. As a speed increases kinetic energy also increases however because the equation has a velocity squared term in it the increase in kinetic energy is exponential compared to the increase in speed. For example when the velocity or speed doubles, the kinetic energy quadruples.