document_title: Green Lantern

question_text: when did the original green lantern come out

question_tokens: when did the original green lantern come out

text: Green Lantern

text: Publication history[edit]

text: Golden Age[edit]

text: Martin Nodell (using the name Mart Dellon) created the first Green Lantern. He first appeared in the Golden Age of comic books in All-American Comics #16 (July 1940), published by All-American Publications, one of three companies that would eventually merge to form DC Comics.

text: This Green Lantern's real name was Alan Scott, a railroad engineer who, after a railway crash, came into possession of a magic lantern which spoke to him and said it would bring power. From this, he crafted a magic ring which gave him a wide variety of powers. The limitations of the ring were that it had to be "charged" every 24 hours by touching it to the lantern for a time, and that it could not directly affect objects made of wood. Alan Scott fought mostly ordinary human villains, but he did have a few paranormal ones such as the immortal Vandal Savage and the zombie Solomon Grundy. Most stories took place in New York.

text: As a popular character in the 1940s, the Green Lantern featured both in anthology books such as All-American Comics and Comic Cavalcade, as well as his own book, Green Lantern. He also appeared in All Star Comics as a member of the superhero team known as the Justice Society of America.

text: After World War II the popularity of superheroes in general declined. The Green Lantern comic book was cancelled with issue #38 (May–June 1949), and All Star Comics #57 (1951) was the character's last Golden Age appearance. When superheroes came back in fashion in later decades, the character Alan Scott was revived, but he was forever marginalized by the new Hal Jordan character who had been created to supplant him (see below). Initially, he made guest appearances in other superheroes' books, but eventually got regular roles in books featuring the Justice Society. He never got another solo series. Between 1995 and 2003, DC Comics changed Alan Scott's superhero codename to "Sentinel" in order to distinguish him from the newer and more popular science fiction Green Lanterns.

text: In 2011, the Alan Scott character was revamped. His costume was redesigned and the source of his powers was changed to that of the mystical power of nature (referred to in the stories as "the Green").

text: Silver Age[edit]

text: In 1959, Julius Schwartz reinvented the Green Lantern character as a science fiction hero named Hal Jordan. Hal Jordan's powers were more or less the same as Alan Scott's, but otherwise this character was completely different than the Green Lantern character of the 1940s. He had a new name, a redesigned costume, and a rewritten origin story. Hal Jordan received his ring from a dying alien and was commissioned as an officer of the Green Lantern Corps, an interstellar law enforcement agency overseen by the Guardians of the Universe.[1]

text: Hal Jordan was introduced in Showcase #22 (September–October 1959). Gil Kane and Sid Greene were the art team most notable on the title in its early years, along with writer John Broome.

text: Later developments[edit]

text: With issue #76 (April 1970), the series made a radical stylistic departure. Editor Schwartz, in one of the company's earliest efforts to provide more than fantasy, worked with the writer-artist team of Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams to spark new interest in the comic book series and address a perceived need for social relevance. They added the character Green Arrow (with the cover, but not the official name, retitled Green Lantern Co-Starring Green Arrow) and had the pair travel through America encountering "real world" issues, to which they reacted in different ways — Green Lantern as fundamentally a lawman, Green Arrow as a liberal iconoclast. Additionally during this run, the groundbreaking "Snowbirds Don't Fly" story was published (issues #85 and #86) in which Green Arrow's teen sidekick Speedy (the later grown-up hero Red Arrow) developed a heroin addiction that he was forcibly made to quit. The stories were critically acclaimed, with publications such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Newsweek citing it as an example of how comic books were "growing up".[2] However, the O'Neil/Adams run was not a commercial success, and the series was cancelled after only 14 issues, though an additional unpublished three installments were finally published as backups in The Flash #217-219.[3]

text: The title would know a number of revivals and cancellations. Its title would change to Green Lantern Corps at one point as the popularity rose and waned. During a time there were two regular titles, each with a Green Lantern, and a third member in the Justice League. A new character, Kyle Rayner, was created to become the feature while Hal Jordan first became the villain Parallax, then died and came back as the Spectre.

text: In the wake of The New Frontier, writer Geoff Johns returned Hal Jordan as Green Lantern in Green Lantern: Rebirth (2004–05). Johns began to lay groundwork for "Blackest Night" (released July 13, 2010[4]), viewing it as the third part of the trilogy started by Rebirth. Expanding on the Green Lantern mythology in the second part, "Sinestro Corps War" (2007), Johns, with artist Ethan van Sciver, found wide critical acclaim and commercial success with the series, which promised the introduction of a spectrum of colored "lanterns".

text: Awards[edit]

text: The series and its creators have received several awards over the years, including the 1961 Alley Award for Best Adventure Hero/Heroine with Own Book[5] and the Academy of Comic Book Arts Shazam Award for Best Continuing Feature in 1970, for Best Individual Story ("No Evil Shall Escape My Sight", Green Lantern vol. 2, #76, by Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams),[6] and in 1971 for Best Individual Story ("Snowbirds Don't Fly", Green Lantern vol. 2, #85 by O'Neil and Adams).[7]

text: Writer O'Neil received the Shazam Award for Best Writer (Dramatic Division) in 1970 for his work on Green Lantern, Batman, Superman, and other titles, while artist Adams received the Shazam for Best Artist (Dramatic Division) in 1970 for his work on Green Lantern and Batman.[6] Inker Dick Giordano received the Shazam Award for Best Inker (Dramatic Division) for his work on Green Lantern and other titles.[6]

text: In Judd Winick's first regular writing assignment on Green Lantern, he wrote a storyline in which an assistant of Kyle Rayner's emerged as a gay character in Green Lantern #137 (June 2001). In Green Lantern #154 (November 2001) the story entitled "Hate Crime" gained media recognition when Terry was brutally beaten in a homophobic attack. Winick was interviewed on Phil Donahue's show on MSNBC for that storyline on August 15, 2002[8] and received two GLAAD Media Awards for his Green Lantern work.[9]

text: In May 2011, Green Lantern placed 7th on IGN's Top 100 Comic Book Heroes of All Time.[10]

text: Fictional character biographies[edit]

text: Golden Age Green Lantern[edit]

text: Alan Scott[edit]

text: Alan Scott's Green Lantern history originally began thousands of years ago when a mystical "green flame" meteor fell to Earth in ancient China. The voice of the flame prophesied that it would act three times: once to bring death (a lamp-maker named Luke Fairclough crafted the green metal of the meteor into a lamp; in fear and as punishment for what they thought sacrilege, the local villagers killed him, only to be destroyed by a sudden burst of the green flame), once to bring life (in modern times, the lamp came into the hands of a patient in a mental institution who fashioned the lamp into a modern lantern; the green flame restored him to sanity and gave him a new life), and once to bring power. By 1940, the lantern passed into the possession of Alan Scott, a young engineer. Following a railroad-bridge collapse of which he was the only survivor, the flame instructed Scott how to fashion a ring from its metal to give him fantastic powers as the superhero Green Lantern. He adopted a colorful costume and became a crime-fighter. Alan was a founding member of the Justice Society of America.

text: After the Crisis on Infinite Earths (although the original origin story was still in continuity), a later Tales of the Green Lantern Corps story was published that brought Scott even closer to the Corps' ranks, when it was revealed that Alan Scott was predated as Earth's Green Lantern by a Green Lantern named Yalan Gur, a resident of China. Not only had the Corps' now-familiar green, black and white uniform motif not yet been adopted, but Yalan Gur altered the basic red uniform to more closely resemble the style of clothing worn by his countrymen. Power ultimately corrupted this early Green Lantern, as he attempted to rule over mankind, which forced the Guardians to cause his ring to manifest a weakness to wood, the material from which most Earth weapons of the time were fashioned. This allowed the Chinese peasants to ultimately defeat their corrupted "champion". His ring and lantern were burned and it was during this process that the “intelligence” inhabiting the ring and the lantern and linking them to the Guardians was damaged. Over time, when it had occasion to manifest itself, this "intelligence" became known as the mystical 'Starheart' of fable.

text: Centuries later, it was explained, when Scott found the mystical lantern, it had no memory of its true origins, save a vague recollection of the uniform of its last master. This was the origin of Scott’s distinctive costume. Due to its damaged link to them, the Guardians presumed the ring and lantern to be lost in whatever cataclysm overcame their last owner of record, thus Scott was never noticed by the Guardians and went on to carve a history of his own apart from that of the Corps, sporting a ring with an artificially induced weakness against anything made of wood. Honoring this separate history, the Guardians never moved to force Scott to relinquish the ring, formally join the Corps, or adopt its colors. Some sort of link between Scott and the Corps, however, was hinted at in a Silver Age crossover story which depicts Scott and Hal Jordan charging their rings at the same Power Battery while both reciting the "Brightest Day" oath. During the Rann-Thanagar War, it was revealed that Scott is an honorary member of the Corps.

text: On June 1, 2012, DC Comics announced that it would be introducing an alternate version of Alan Scott as a gay man in the title "Earth 2." The New 52 issue was released on June 6, 2012.[11] In its story, Alan Scott and his partner Sam were both passengers aboard a train, but the latter was killed when their train was wrecked in the railroad-bridge collapse that Scott alone survived; a magical green flame found Alan amongst the rubble. Telling him he is to become an avatar of the flame's great power and that he must channel this power through an item of importance to his heart, Alan chooses the engagement ring he was to give his boyfriend, becoming Green Lantern. This alternate version is not a member of the Green Lantern Corps, which doesn't exist in Earth 2, but rather adopts the name Green Lantern for himself, for his powers derives his mystical powers from the Green, the elemental force which connects plant life on Earth.

text: Silver Age Green Lantern[edit]

text: Hal Jordan[edit]

text: The character of Harold "Hal" Jordan was a second-generation test pilot, having followed in the footsteps of his father. He was given the power ring and battery (lantern) by a dying alien named Abin Sur, whose spaceship crashed on Earth. Abin Sur used his ring to seek out an individual who was "utterly honest and born without fear" to take his place as a member of the corps. At one point, when Hal Jordan was incapacitated, it was revealed that there were two individuals matching the specified criteria on Earth, the other being Guy Gardner, and the ring chose Jordan solely because of his proximity to Abin Sur. Gardner then became listed as Hal's "backup", even though he had a strong friendship with Barry Allen (The Flash). Gardner would fill in if Jordan was unavailable or otherwise incapacitated. Later, when Gardner was put into a coma, it turned out that by then there was a third human suitable for the task, John Stewart, who was designated as the Earth Sector's "backup" Lantern. Jordan, as Green Lantern, became a founding member of the Justice League of America and as of the mid-2000s is, along with John Stewart, one of the two active-duty Lanterns in Earth's sector of space.

text: Jordan also automatically became a member of the Green Lantern Corps, a galactic "police" force which bears some similarities to the "Lensmen" from the science fiction series written by E.E. Smith, although both creators Julius Schwartz and John Broome denied ever reading Smith's stories.[12] Nevertheless, the early 1980s miniseries "Green Lantern Corps" honors the similarity with two characters in the corps: Eddore of Tront and Arisia.

text: Following the rebirth of Superman and the destruction of Green Lantern's hometown of Coast City in the early 1990s, Hal Jordan seemingly went insane and destroyed the Green Lantern Corps and the Central Power Battery. Now calling himself Parallax, Hal Jordan would devastate the DC Universe on and off for the next several years. However, after Earth's sun was threatened by a Sun-Eater, Jordan sacrificed his life, expending the last of his vast power to reignite the dying star. Jordan subsequently returned from beyond the grave as the Spectre, the divine Spirit of God's Vengeance, whom Jordan attempted to transform into a Spirit of Redemption, which ended in failure.

text: In Green Lantern: Rebirth, it is revealed that Jordan was under the influence of a creature known as Parallax when he turned renegade. Parallax was a creature of pure fear that had been imprisoned in the Central Power Battery by the Guardians of the Universe in the distant past. Imprisonment had rendered the creature dormant and it was eventually forgotten, becoming known merely as the "yellow impurity" in the power rings. Sinestro was able to wake Parallax and encourage it to seek out Hal Jordan as a host. Although Parallax had been trying to corrupt Jordan (via his ring) for some time, it was not until after the destruction of Coast City that it was able to succeed. It took advantage of Jordan's weakened emotional state to lure him to Oa and cause him to attack anyone who stood in his way. After killing several Green Lanterns, Jordan finally entered the Central Power Battery and absorbed all the power, unwittingly freeing the Parallax entity and allowed it to graft onto his soul.

text: The Spectre bonded with Jordan in the hopes of freeing the former Green Lantern's soul from Parallax's taint, but was not strong enough to do so. In Green Lantern: Rebirth, Parallax began to assert control of the Parallax-Spectre-Jordan composite. Thanks to a supreme effort of will, Jordan was able to free himself from Parallax, rejoin his soul to his body and reclaim his power ring. The newly revived (and rejuvenated) Jordan awoke just in time to save Kyle Rayner and Green Arrow from Sinestro. After the Korugarian's defeat, Jordan was able to successfully lead his fellow Green Lanterns in battle against Parallax and with help from Guardians Sayd and Ganthet, imprisoned it within the personal power batteries of Earth's Lanterns, rendering the Green Lantern's rings free of the yellow impurity, provided they had the power of will to do so. Hal Jordan is once again a member of both the Justice League and the Green Lantern Corps, and along with John Stewart is one of the two Corps members assigned to Sector 2814, personally defeating Sinestro in the Sinestro Corps War. Jordan is designated as Green Lantern 2814.1.

text: Post-Sinestro Corps War, DC Comics revisited the origin of Hal Jordan as a precursor to Blackest Night storyline, the next chapter in the Geoff Johns era on Green Lantern. Hal Jordan is the Green Lantern portrayed by Ryan Reynolds in the 2011 Green Lantern film.

text: Bronze Age Green Lanterns[edit]

text: Guy Gardner[edit]

text: In the late 1960s, Guy Gardner appeared as the second choice to replace Abin Sur as Green Lantern of sector 2814. Gardner was a candidate to receive Abin Sur's ring, but Jordan was closer. This placed him as the "backup" Green Lantern for Jordan. But early in his career as a Green Lantern, tragedy struck Gardner as a power battery blew up in his face, putting him in a coma for years. During the Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Guardians split into factions, one of which appointed a newly revived Gardner as their champion. As a result of his years in a coma, Guy was emotionally unstable, although he still mostly managed to fight valiantly. He has gone through many changes, including wielding Sinestro's yellow Guardian power ring, then gaining and losing Vuldarian powers, and readmission to the Corps during Green Lantern: Rebirth. He later became part of the Green Lantern Honor Guard, and oversees the training of new Green Lanterns. Gardner is designated as Green Lantern 2814.2 within the Corps.

text: Guy Gardner helped lead the defense of Oa during the events of Blackest Night.

text: Following his outstanding acts of valour, the Guardians appoint Guy to a unique role and highest rank in the Green Lantern Corps-Sentinel, answering directly to the Guardians themselves.

text: John Stewart[edit]

text: In the early 1970s, John Stewart, an architect from Detroit, was selected by the Guardians to replace a comatose Guy Gardner as the backup Green Lantern for Jordan. When Jordan resigned from the Corps for an extended period of time, Stewart served as the regular Lantern, coming into his own as he battled numerous Green Lantern villains and played a key role during the Crisis on Infinite Earths. During that time the Guardians of the Universe assigned Katma Tui to train Stewart, and the two developed romantic feelings for each other. They married, but Katma was soon murdered by longtime Green Lantern villain Star Sapphire. Stewart was crushed by this, and his life began to unravel. He reached his lowest point when he failed to save the planet Xanshi from destruction during the Cosmic Odyssey.

text: John Stewart redeemed himself during the Mosaic crisis, when an insane Guardian abducted cities from all over the universe and placed them together on Oa. When the Guardian was defeated, the cities remained, as the other Guardians claimed to not have enough energy in the Central Power Battery to send them home. While they gathered the resources, John Stewart was assigned to oversee the jammed together communities. Using his intellect and unconventional thinking, he formed the warring communities into a cohesive society. He was aided by Rose Hardin, a farmer from West Virginia who was trapped on Oa, due to her town being abducted. Stewart once again found love with Rose, and the two of them came to feel more comfortable on their new world than they did back on Earth.

text: Stewart eventually deduced that the Guardians had the energy to send the cities home whenever they wanted, and that they let them remain on Oa as an experiment in cosmic integration, and also as a test for John Stewart. Stewart passed the test, and discovered that he was a figure in Oan prophecy. That was why the Guardians directly chose him instead of allowing a Power Ring to do it, as is standard procedure. John Stewart rose to a new level of awareness and became the first mortal Guardian of the Universe. He was also rewarded with the resurrection of Katma Tui, which caused him to break up with Rose.

text: Stewart's new powers and resurrected wife were taken from him when Hal Jordan went mad and became Parallax, absorbing the power from the Central Power Battery. During this time, the Green Lantern Corps was disbanded, and Stewart went on to lead the Darkstars, a new organization of universal peacekeepers led by the Controllers, offshoots of the Guardians of the Universe. During a battle, Stewart was badly injured and left paralyzed from the waist down. Hal Jordan eventually restored his ability to walk before sacrificing himself to save Earth's sun. Soon after, John Stewart found himself hunted by a serial killer from Xanshi called Fatality. She sought out any remnants of the Green Lantern Corps so that she may kill them in the name of avenging her doomed planet. Stewart fended off Fatality with residual energy he blasted from his body, which was in him due to Hal Jordan healing his crippling condition, however, this left him unable to walk again.

text: Stewart later visited Fatality while she was in custody, and she revealed to him that his back was fine, and he had the ability to walk if he wanted to. Stewart had imposed a psychological block upon himself due to feeling guilty over his sister's death. Stewart overcame this condition and was given a power ring by Kyle Rayner. Rayner departed Earth and Stewart became the Green Lantern of Earth once again, and also a member of the Justice League of America.

text: When the Green Lantern Corps reformed, Stewart begun serving with Jordan as one of his sector's two designated regular-duty Lanterns, designated as Green Lantern 2814.3. Since then, he played key roles in all big Green Lantern events, such as The Sinestro Corps War and Blackest Night.

text: In the New 52 continuity, John Stewart was a U.S. Marine along with being an architect and the son of a social activist. He started a romantic relationship with his longtime enemy Fatality, who by that point had become a Star Sapphire and apparently forgave him for failing to save her world. In the events leading up to the "Uprising", Fatality was captured by shape-shifting Durlans, and a Durlan operative replicated her and took her place. John Stewart was at first hesitant about the relationship, but he eventually came to love Fatality, but it turns out that it had been the impostor by that point. In the final battle of the "Uprising", the impostor revealed itself as Verrat Din, an eons old Durlan, and destroyed Fatality's Star Sapphire ring, having no use for it after gaining the power of a Daxamite. Though Stewart defeated the powerful threat, he was shaken by having been misled so long, and having been intimate with a Durlan shape-shifter.

text: Stewart immediately set out to find the real Fatality, and when he did, he was astonished to discover that she had reverted to hating him. Fatality revealed that she was forcibly inducted into the Star Sapphires and brainwashed into being one of them. When her ring was destroyed, the spell was broken. Every moment she was with Stewart, she was trapped within herself. She revealed that she never loved John Stewart and departed, leaving Stewart emotionally crushed.

text: John Stewart is notable for being the Green Lantern showcased on the Justice League and Justice League Unlimited cartoon shows, as well as being the primary Green Lantern of the DC Animated Universe.

text: Modern Age Green Lantern[edit]

text: Kyle Rayner[edit]

text: Kyle Rayner was a struggling freelance artist when he was approached by the last Guardian of the Universe, Ganthet, to become a new Green Lantern with the very last power ring. Ganthet's reasons for choosing Rayner remained a secret for quite some time. Despite not being from the same cloth of bravery and fearlessness as Hal Jordan—or perhaps because of that—Rayner proved to be popular with readers and his fellow characters. Having continually proven himself on his own and with the JLA, he became known amongst the Oans as The Torch Bearer. He briefly operated as Ion after using the power of the entire Green Lantern Corps. He was responsible for the rebirth of the Guardians and the re-ignition of the Central Power Battery, essentially restoring all that Jordan had destroyed as Parallax.

text: Kyle Rayner was chosen to wield the last ring because he knew fear, and Parallax had been released from the Central Power Battery. Ganthet knew this and chose Kyle because his experiences dealing with fear enabled him to resist Parallax. Because Parallax is a manifestation of fear, and yellow, none of the other Green Lanterns, including Hal, could harm Parallax and, therefore, came under his control. Kyle taught them to feel and overcome fear so they could defeat Parallax and incarcerate him in the Central Power Battery once again.

text: Kyle became Ion, who is later revealed to be the manifestation of willpower in the same way Parallax is fear. During the Sinestro Corps War between the Green Lantern Corps and the Sinestro Corps, Ion was imprisoned while Parallax possesses Kyle. In Green Lantern (vol. 4) #24, Parallax consumes Hal Jordan. Hal Jordan enters into Kyle's prison, and with his help, Kyle finally escapes Parallax.

text: Afterward, Ganthet and Sayd trap Parallax in the Lanterns of the four Green Lanterns of Earth. Ganthet asks Kyle to give up his right to be Ion and become a Green Lantern again. Kyle accepts, and Ganthet gives Kyle a power ring. Kyle is outfitted with a new costume including a mask that looks like the one from his first uniform. Kyle is now a member of the Green Lantern Corps Honor Guard, and has been partnered with Guy Gardner.

text: Kyle now shows up mostly as part of the ensemble cast of Green Lantern Corps. Corps rookie Sodam Yat took over the mantle of Ion. Sodam has made an appearance in the Legion of Super Heroes Final Crisis tie-in Legion of Three Worlds as the last surviving Green Lantern/Guardian of the Universe.

text: Kyle is designated as Green Lantern 2814.4 within the Corps.[citation needed]

text: Kyle Rayner died in Green Lantern Corps #42 (Jan. 2010) after sacrificing himself to save Oa from an attack by the Black Lantern Corps. The following issue, Kyle is brought back to life by the power of a Star Sapphire who connects Soranik Natu's heart to his heart.

text: Simon Baz[edit]

text: Simon Baz is a Lebanese American Muslim from the Detroit suburb of Dearborn, Michigan. He first appeared in The New 52! FCBD #1 before making his first full appearance in Green Lantern #0 during the "Rise of the Third Army" storyline written by Geoff Johns. He was caught by the police street racing in a stolen car with an armed bomb in the back of the van. While being questioned by authorities, Sinestro's Green Lantern ring chose Simon as its next ring bearer, recruiting him into the Green Lantern Corps. The squirrel-like Lantern B'dg follows, becoming Baz's mentor and friend. The Justice League eventually tracks Baz down and questions him as to how he came into the possession of a Green Lantern ring. Batman tries to disarm him by removing Simon's ring, but self-defense mechanisms of the ring prevent this.[13] Following the events of "Wrath of The First Lantern",[14][15][16][17] Simon Baz was offered the opportunity to join Amanda Waller and Steve Trevor's "Justice League of America" under the pretense that his criminal charges would be dropped and his innocence publicly declared after FBI Agent Franklin Fed vouched for him.[18] During the events of the "Trinity War" storyline, after Cyborg's (Victor) body was mangled by Crime Syndicate member "The Grid", Baz's ring was the only thing preventing Victor from death.[19] During the battle against Relic, when Lantern Guy Gardner and the Red Lantern Corps become the protectors of space sector 2814, Simon was appointed Green Lantern ambassador on earth by Hal Jordan. Additionally per Hal´s request Simon became the protector of Hal Jordan's family.[citation needed] In Green Lantern #20, after the fierce battle against the First Lantern, it was revealed that Simon Baz will go on to train the first female Green Lantern of Earth, Jessica Cruz.[17]

text: Jessica Cruz[edit]

text: First mentioned in Green Lantern #20 as the first female Green Lantern of Earth. Jessica Cruz is a young Latin American woman who was forced to become the unwilling host to the evil Ring of Volthoom after "Power Ring" dies in his alternate Earth unverse. Though she is not technically "Power Ring", as she is not a member of the Crime Syndicate and has no association with the organization, for namesake purposes she is dubbed "Power Ring" while the ring uses her as a host. She is helped by the Justice League and Simon Baz, who help her understand her cursed powers. In the Darkseid War, she becomes trapped inside the Ring of Volthoom, as Volthoom himself takes over Jessica's body. She then battles the previous wearers of the ring with the help of Cyborg, and forces her body in front of the Black Racer (who at the time was controlling the Flash) and kills Volthoom. After the battle, whilst the League mourns her motionless body, a Green Lantern ring appears and Jessica is made the 6th Green Lantern of Earth, to everyone's surprise.

text: In Green Lantern: Rebirth #1, she meets up with Simon Baz to battle a Manhunter. This turns out to be an exercise controlled by Hal Jordan, as he needs them to protect Earth whilst he goes on a mission to find the rest of the Corps. He then fuses both their Lanterns into one, which can only be used when they are together. Hal also gives them membership into the Justice League to help with their training.

text: Others who have headlined as Green Lantern[edit]

text: Jade[edit]

text: The daughter of Alan Scott, Jennifer-Lynn Hayden would discover she shared her father's mystical connection to the Starheart, which gave her the abilities of a Green Lantern. Choosing to follow in her father's footsteps, she became the superheroine Jade. She would later fight a manifestation of the Starheart and lose those abilities. When Jade was fighting an Okaaran monster, she was saved by an orange lantern named Cade and fell in love with him.

text: After Jade was stripped of her powers, Kyle Rayner gave her a copy of Hal Jordan's power ring. When Rayner left Earth to restart the Green Lantern Corps, Jade donned the classic Green Lantern uniform and served as the planet's Green Lantern until losing the ring during a battle with the villain Fatality. Later, when the ring was returned to her, she changed her Green Lantern uniform to a modified version of Rayner's. Jade continued to function as a Green Lantern until Rayner, as Ion, used his power to restore her connection to the Starheart. During Infinite Crisis, she died while trying to stop Alexander Luthor, Jr. from destroying the universe to create a new multiverse. Upon her death, Jade returned her Starheart power to Rayner. In the Blackest Night event, her remains have been reanimated as one of the Black Lantern Corps after receiving a black power ring. She was resurrected by the Life Entity along with eleven other Black Lantern Corps members.

text: Thaal Sinestro[edit]

text: Sinestro was born on the planet Korugar and became Green Lantern of space sector 1417. He was a friend of Abin Sur and mentor to Hal Jordan. His desire for order was an asset in the Corps, and initially led him to be considered one of the greatest Green Lanterns. As the years passed, he became more and more fixated upon not simply protecting his sector, but on preserving order in the society of his home planet no matter what the cost. Eventually, he concluded that the best way to accomplish this was to conquer Korugar and rule the planet as a dictator. Exposed by Hal Jordan and punished, he later wielded a yellow ring of fear from Qward. Later in league with Parallax, he would establish the Sinestro Corps, which began the War of Light. Following Blackest Night and War of the Green Lanterns Sinestro would once again receive a Green Lantern ring and temporarily headline the monthly Green Lantern following The New 52.

text: Jediah Caul[edit]

text: Premiering in Green Lantern: New Guardians Annual #1, Caul is a deep undercover Green Lantern operative that works in the Tenebrian Dominion. He unwillingly helps Carol Ferris and the New Guardians attempt to petition Lady Styx to send aid against the Third Army. For betraying them, the New Guardians leave Caul behind and he is forced to become part of a reality program called "The Hunted", stripped of his powers and with his discharged power ring embedded into his chest. Caul stars as part of an ensemble cast of spacebound DC characters including the Blue Beetle and a new Captain K'rot in the "Hunted" main feature of Threshold. Caul received his Green Lantern Ring after he shot and killed its previous bearer, unsure himself why he was then chosen. Caul is able to save Sh'diki Borough on the planet Tolerance after it had been bottled by Brainiac. Caul is later informed that The Hunted has been cancelled and offered the lead role on a new show, Team Cauldron with the rest of his friends and Hunted competitors. Caul agrees to the role, having his power ring re-embedded into his chest. He is granted a meeting with Lady Styx to finalize his new role. However, as soon as Caul materializes at her base, he is killed by multiple gunshots, as planned by Colonel T'omas T'morra. In a glimmernet commercial, it is shown that T'morra replaces Caul in the proposed new show. However Caul is shown alive later along with Captain K'rot in tow when the planet Telos manifests during Convergence investigating it alongside Superman, Supergirl, Guy Gardner and the Red Lanterns.

text: Powers and abilities[edit]

text: The ring is powered by willpower. Each Green Lantern wears a ring that grants them a variety of possibilities. The full extent of the ring's ability has never been rigorously defined in the stories, but two consistent traits are that it grants the power of flight and that all its effects are accompanied by a green light.

text: Early Green Lantern stories showed the characters performing all sorts of feats with the ring, from shrinking objects to turning people invisible. Later stories de-emphasized these abilities in favor of constructs.

text: The signature power of all Green Lanterns is the ability to conjure "constructs:" solid green objects that the Green Lantern can control telekinetically. These can be anything, such as a disembodied fist to beat a foe, a shield to block an attack, a sword to cut a rope, or chains to bind a prisoner. Whatever their shape or size, these constructs are always pure green in color, unless a Lantern is skillful enough to know how to change the EM spectrum the construct emits. Hal Jordan has shown the ability to have a construct emit kryptonite radiation under Batman's guidance.

text: The rings of the Green Lantern Corps allow their bearers to travel very quickly across interstellar distances, fast enough that they can efficiently patrol the universe. They allow the wearer to survive in virtually any environment, and also remove the need to eat, sleep and pass waste. The rings can translate practically any language in the universe. They possess powerful sensors that can identify and analyze objects. Lanterns are granted full access to all Guardian knowledge by their rings, through the Book of Oa.

text: A noteworthy power the rings do not have is the ability to automatically heal injuries, though they can provide shielding. In Hal Jordan's origin story, Abin Sur passed on his ring to Hal because he was unable to treat his own fatal injuries. If the Green Lantern happens to be a skilled physician, then the ring can be invaluable as it can conjure any conceivable medical tool, but it cannot do much for a Lantern who lacks medical expertise. When Hal Jordan breaks his arm, the best he can do is conjure up a cast. This is further extended into an ability to replace large sections of one's injured body with constructs, but this too requires detailed biological knowledge of one's body and concentration enough to prolong the construct.

text: Alan Scott's ring is unable to directly affect anything made of wood. Alan can conjure a green shield to block bullets, but a wooden club will pass through it effortlessly. The rings of Hal Jordan and his colleagues originally shared a similar weakness to anything colored yellow, though due to the removal of the yellow impurity from the Central Battery on Oa, more recent stories have removed this weakness.

text: The effectiveness of the ring is tied to the wearer's willpower. A Green Lantern with strong willpower will best a weaker-willed Lantern in a duel. Anything which weakens the Green Lantern's mind, such as a telepathic attack, may render his ring useless.

text: Green Lantern Oath[edit]

text: Green Lantern is famous for the oath he recites when he charges his ring. Originally, the oath was:

text:
...and I shall shed my light over dark evil.
For the dark things cannot stand the light,
The light of the Green Lantern!

text: This oath is also used by Lanterns Tomar-Re of sector 2813 and Chief Administrator Salaak.[20] In the mid-1940s, this was revised into the form that became famous during the Hal Jordan era:

text:
In brightest day, in blackest night,
No evil shall escape my sight!
Let those who worship evil's might
Beware my power, Green Lantern's light!

text: The oath in this form is credited to Alfred Bester,[21] who wrote many Green Lantern stories in the 1940s. This version of the oath was first spoken by Alan Scott in Green Lantern #9 from the fall of 1943. Scott would revert to reciting his original oath after he was reintroduced during the Silver Age.

text: Many Green Lanterns have a unique personal oath, but some oaths are shared by several Lanterns. They are usually four lines long with a rhyme scheme of “AAAA” or “AABB”.

text: The Pre-Crisis version of Hal Jordan was inspired to create his oath after a series of adventures in which he developed new ways to detect evasive criminals: in the first adventure, he used his ring as radar to find robbers who had blinded him with a magnesium flash; in the second, he tracked criminals in a dark cave by using his ring to make them glow with phosphorescence; finally, Jordan tracked safecrackers by the faint shockwaves from the explosives they had used.

text: Medphyll, the Green Lantern of the planet J586 (seen in Swamp Thing #61, "All Flesh is Grass"), a planet where a sentient plant species lives, has the following oath:

text: Other notable oaths include that of Jack T. Chance,

text: and that of Rot Lop Fan, a Green Lantern whose species lacks sight, and thus has no concepts of brightness, darkness, day, night, color, or lanterns.

text: Since Green Lantern: Rebirth and the re-establishment of the Green Lantern Corps, the only oath used has been the Brightest Day, Blackest Night version.

text: In Green Lantern (vol. 4) #27, the Alpha Lanterns use the oath:

text: In Legion of 3 Worlds, Sodam Yat in the 31st century – the last of the Green Lanterns and the last of the Guardians – recited a new oath:

text: In Batman: The Dawnbreaker #1, the Dawnbreaker (an amalgamation of Batman and Green Lantern from the Dark Multiverse's Earth-32) creates and recites his own oath after the death of the Guardians of the Universe and the Green Lantern Corps by his own hands:

text: In the video game, Infinite Crisis, Hal Jordan of Earth-13 (the Arcane universe) has his own variation:

text: In the animated TV series Duck Dodgers, Duck Dodgers temporarily becomes a Green Lantern after accidentally picking up Hal Jordan's laundry. In the first part of the episode, he forgets the real quote and makes up his own version:

text: In 2011, soon after the release of the Green Lantern movie, a trailer for The Muppets featured Kermit reciting a parody of the oath:[22]

text: The TV show, Mad, included a movie parody called "RiOa", a fusion of Green Lantern and Rio. Blu from Rio is turned into a Green Lantern, and recruits Big Bird, the Road Runner, Mordecai from Regular Show, Mumble from Happy Feet, and one of the Angry Birds and turns them into Green Lanterns.

text: The phrase "in the brightest day and in the darkest night" can also be found in a letter Sullivan Ballou wrote to his wife during the American Civil War, shortly before he was killed in the First Battle of Bull Run (1861).

text: With the exception of Alan Scott, all Lantern oaths are formatted in four lines of Iambic tetrameter.

text: In other media[edit]


document_title: Schitt's Creek

question_text: how many seasons of schitt creek are there

root

text: Schitt's Creek

text: Production[edit]

text: On January 12, 2015, CBC renewed the show for a second season.[3][4] Production resumed during the second week of April 2015.[5]

tag: p

text: The second season premiered in Canada on January 12, 2016 on CBC.[6] It was announced on February 17, 2016, that the CBC renewed the show for a third season[7] which began broadcasting on January 10, 2017.[8]

text: On March 10, 2017 the show was renewed for a fourth season.[9]

text: Plot[edit]

text: The series stars Eugene Levy as Johnny Rose, a wealthy video store magnate, and Catherine O'Hara as his wife Moira, a washed up soap star. The couple loses all their money because of their crooked business manager's theft and failure to pay their taxes and are forced to rebuild their lives in their only remaining asset: the small town of Schitt's Creek, which they once bought as a joke gift for the birthday of their son. They wind up living in two adjacent rooms of a rundown motel with their pampered thirty-something adult children: the son, David, and a daughter, Alexis.[10] The cast includes Daniel Levy, Annie Murphy, Chris Elliott,[10] Jennifer Robertson and Emily Hampshire. The show is based on a series of situations contrasting the once-rich family and their big-city, worldly attitudes suddenly with small-town living and the honest, down-to-earth, hard-working folk who live in Schitt's Creek.

text: The series is filmed on location in Goodwood, Ontario, in the Regional Municipality of Durham of the Greater Toronto Area and Mono, Ontario, where the motel scenes are filmed.[11] The interior scenes for the first two seasons were filmed at Pinewood Toronto Studios in Toronto,[12] while the interior scenes for the third season were shot at Dufferin Gate Studios in Toronto.[13]

text: Cast and characters[edit]

text:
Eugene Levy as Johnny Rose
Catherine O'Hara as Moira Rose
Daniel Levy as David Rose
Annie Murphy as Alexis Rose
Chris Elliott as Roland Schitt, the mayor
Jennifer Robertson as Jocelyn Schitt, the mayor's wife
Emily Hampshire as Stevie Budd, the motel clerk
Tim Rozon as Mutt Schitt
Sarah Levy as Twyla Sands, the diner waitress
Dustin Milligan as Ted Mullens
Robin Duke as Wendy Kurtz
Rizwan Manji as Ray Butani, the only real estate agent in town, and also a member of the town council
John Hemphill as Bob Currie, a member of the town council
Karen Robinson as Ronnie Lee, a member of the town council
Steve Lund as Jake
Jasmin Geljo as Ivan
Noah Reid as Patrick

tag: ul

text: Episodes[edit]

text:
Season
Episodes
Originally aired

First aired
Last aired

1
13
January 13, 2015 (2015-01-13)
March 31, 2015 (2015-03-31)

2
13
January 12, 2016 (2016-01-12)
March 29, 2016 (2016-03-29)

3
13
January 10, 2017 (2017-01-10)
April 4, 2017 (2017-04-04)

tag: table

text: Reception[edit]

text: Schitt's Creek has received mixed reviews. On Rotten Tomatoes the first season has a rating of 50%, based on 14 reviews, with an average rating of 6.6/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "The title is one of the best jokes of Schitt's Creek, but performances from Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara give the writing a comedic boost."[14]

text: On Metacritic, the first season has a score of 62 out of 100, based on 10 critics, indicating "generally favourable reviews".[15]

text: Schitt's Creek has received positive reviews from various media outlets including Los Angeles Times which describes the show as "very funny, beautifully played, sometimes touching and, though its premise is familiar — rich family loses money — quite its own animal."[16] and New York Post who stated that "The Levys nicely develop their fish-out-of-water concept by showing how the family tries to fit in out of necessity."[17]

text: Awards[edit]

text: In 2015, Schitt's Creek's first season received two Directors Guild of Canada awards from three nominations. At the 2016 ceremony, season one received nine Canadian Screen Awards from 16 nominations. Schitt's Creek's second season has received a total of 13 nominations for the upcoming 5th Canadian Screen Awards.[18]

text: International broadcast[edit]

text: The series was picked up in the United States by Pop (formerly TVGN) and premiered on February 11, 2015.[19][20] The show has also been picked up in New Zealand by TV2 and TVNZ on Demand.[21] The three seasons appear, though not always together, on different streaming television services worldwide.


document_title: Seat belt

question_text: when did seat belts get installed in cars

question_tokens: when did seat belts get installed in cars

text: Seat belt

text: Efficiency[edit]

text: An analysis conducted in the United States in 1984 compared a variety of seat belt types alone and in combination with air bags.[1] The range of fatality reduction for front seat passengers was broad, from 20% to 55%, as was the range of major injury, from 25% to 60%.[1] More recently, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has summarized this data by stating "seat belts reduce serious crash-related injuries and deaths by about half."[2] Most seatbelt malfunctions are as a result of there being too much slack in the seatbelt at the time of the accident.[3]

text: History[edit]

text: Seat belts were invented by English engineer George Cayley in the mid-19th century,[4] though Edward J. Claghorn of New York, was granted the first patent (U.S. Patent 312,085, on February 10, 1885 for a safety belt).[5] Claghorn was granted United States Patent #312,085 for a Safety-Belt for tourists, painters, firemen, etc. who are being raised or lowered, described in the patent as "designed to be applied to the person, and provided with hooks and other attachments for securing the person to a fixed object."

text: In 1946, Dr. C. Hunter Shelden had opened a neurological practice at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena, California. In the early 1950s, Dr. Shelden had made a major contribution to the automotive industry with his idea of retractable seat belts. This came about greatly in part from the high number of head injuries coming through the emergency rooms.[6] He investigated the early seat belts whose primitive designs were implicated in these injuries and deaths. His findings were published in the November 5, 1955 Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) in which he proposed not only the retractable seat belt, but also recessed steering wheels, reinforced roofs, roll bars, door locks and passive restraints such as the air bag. Subsequently, in 1959, Congress passed legislation requiring all automobiles to comply with certain safety standards.[7]

text: American car manufacturers Nash (in 1949) and Ford (in 1955) offered seat belts as options, while Swedish Saab first introduced seat belts as standard in 1958.[8] After the Saab GT 750 was introduced at the New York Motor Show in 1958 with safety belts fitted as standard, the practice became commonplace.[9]

text: Glenn Sheren of Mason, Michigan submitted a patent application on March 31, 1955 for an automotive seat belt and was awarded US Patent 2,855,215 in 1958. This was a continuation of an earlier patent application that Mr. Sheren had filed on September 22, 1952.[10]

text: However, the first modern three point seat belt (the so-called CIR-Griswold restraint) used in most consumer vehicles today was patented in 1955 U.S. Patent 2,710,649 by the Americans Roger W. Griswold and Hugh DeHaven. Fatal car accidents were rapidly increasing in Sweden during the 1950s. When a study at Vattenfall of accidents among employees revealed that the majority of casualties came from car accidents, two Vattenfall engineers (Bengt Odelgard and Per-Olof Weman) started to develop the safety belt. Their work set the standard for safety belts in Swedish cars and was presented to Swedish manufacturer Volvo in the late 1950s.[11] The 3-point seatbelt was developed to its modern form by Swedish inventor Nils Bohlin for Volvo—who introduced it in 1959 as standard equipment. In addition to designing an effective three-point belt, Bohlin demonstrated its effectiveness in a study of 28,000 accidents in Sweden. Unbelted occupants sustained fatal injuries throughout the whole speed scale, whereas none of the belted occupants were fatally injured at accident speeds below 60 mph. No belted occupant was fatally injured if the passenger compartment remained intact.[12] Bohlin was granted U.S. Patent 3,043,625 for the device.[8]

text: The world's first seat belt law was put in place in 1970, in the state of Victoria, Australia, making the wearing of a seat belt compulsory for drivers and front-seat passengers. This legislation was enacted after trialing Hemco seatbelts, designed by Desmond Hemphill (1926–2001), in the front seats of police vehicles, lowering the incidence of officer injury and death.[13]

text: Types[edit]

text: Two-point[edit]

text: A 2-point belt attaches at its two endpoints, and was invented in the early 1900s by Jack Swearingen of Louisville, Kentucky.[citation needed]

text: Lap[edit]

text: A lap belt is a strap that goes over the waist. This was the most commonly installed type of belt prior to legislation requiring 3-point belts, and is primarily found in older cars. Coaches are equipped with lap belts (although many newer coaches have three-point belts), as are passenger aircraft seats.

text: University of Minnesota Professor James J. (Crash) Ryan was the inventor of and held the patent on the automatic retractable lap safety belt. Ralph Nader cited Ryan's work in Unsafe at Any Speed and in 1966 President Lyndon Johnson signed two bills requiring safety belts in all passenger vehicles starting in 1968.[14]

text: Until the 1980s, three-point belts were commonly available only in the front outboard seats of cars; the back seats were only often fitted with lap belts. Evidence of the potential of lap belts to cause separation of the lumbar vertebrae and the sometimes associated paralysis, or "seat belt syndrome", led to progressive revision of passenger safety regulations in nearly all developed countries to require 3-point belts first in all outboard seating positions and eventually in all seating positions in passenger vehicles. Since September 1, 2007, all new cars sold in the U.S. require a lap and shoulder belt in the center rear seat.[15] Besides regulatory changes, "seat belt syndrome" has led to tremendous liability for vehicle manufacturers. One Los Angeles case resulted in a $45 million jury verdict against the Ford Motor Company; the resulting $30 million judgment (after deductions for another defendant who settled prior to trial) was affirmed on appeal in 2006.[16]

text: Sash[edit]

text: A "sash" or shoulder harness is a strap that goes diagonally over the vehicle occupant's outboard shoulder and is buckled inboard of his or her lap. The shoulder harness may attach to the lap belt tongue, or it may have a tongue and buckle completely separate from those of the lap belt. Shoulder harnesses of this separate or semi-separate type were installed in conjunction with lap belts in the outboard front seating positions of many vehicles in the North American market starting at the inception of the shoulder belt requirement of the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 208 on 1 January 1968. However, if the shoulder strap is used without the lap belt, the vehicle occupant is likely to "submarine", or slide forward in the seat and out from under the belt, in a frontal collision. In the mid-1970s, 3-point belt systems such as Chrysler's "Uni-Belt" began to supplant the separate lap and shoulder belts in American-made cars, though such 3-point belts had already been supplied in European vehicles such as Volvos, Mercedes, and Saabs for some years.

text: Three-point[edit]

text: A 3-point belt is a Y-shaped arrangement, similar to the separate lap and sash belts, but unitized. Like the separate lap-and-sash belt, in a collision the 3-point belt spreads out the energy of the moving body over the chest, pelvis, and shoulders. Volvo introduced the first production three-point belt in 1959.[17] The first car with a three-point belt was a Volvo PV 544 that was delivered to a dealer in Kristianstad on August 13, 1959. However, the first car model to feature the three-point seat belt as a standard item was the 1959 Volvo 122, first outfitted with a two-point belt at initial delivery in 1958, replaced with the three-point seat belt the following year.[18] The three-point belt was developed by Nils Bohlin who had earlier also worked on ejection seats at Saab.[19] Volvo then made the new seat belt design patent open in the interest of safety and made it available to other car manufacturers for free.[20][21]

text: Belt-in-Seat (BIS)[edit]

text: The BIS is a three-point harness with the shoulder belt attached to the seat itself, rather than to the vehicle structure. The first car using this system was the Range Rover Classic. Fitment was standard on the front seats from 1970.[22] Some cars like the Renault Vel Satis use this system for the front seats. A General Motors assessment concluded seat-mounted 3-point belts offer better protection especially to smaller vehicle occupants,[23] though GM did not find a safety performance improvement in vehicles with seat-mounted belts versus belts mounted to the vehicle body.[24]

text: BIS type belts have been used by automakers in convertibles and pillarless hardtops, where there is no "B" pillar to affix the upper mount of the belt. Chrysler and Cadillac are well known for using this design. Antique auto enthusiasts sometimes replace original seats in their cars with BIS-equipped front seats, providing a measure of safety not available when these cars were new. However, modern BIS systems typically use electronics that must be installed and connected with the seats and the vehicle's electrical system in order to function properly.[citation needed]

text: 4-, 5-, and 6-point[edit]

text: Five-point harnesses are typically found in child safety seats and in racing cars. The lap portion is connected to a belt between the legs and there are two shoulder belts, making a total of five points of attachment to the seat. A 4-point harness is similar, but without the strap between the legs, while a 6-point harness has two belts between the legs. In NASCAR, the 6-point harness became popular after the death of Dale Earnhardt, who was wearing a five-point harness when he suffered his fatal crash; as it was first thought that his belt had broken, and broke his neck at impact, some teams ordered a six-point harness in response.[25]

text: Seven-point[edit]

text: Aerobatic aircraft frequently use a combination harness consisting of a five-point harness with a redundant lap-belt attached to a different part of the aircraft. While providing redundancy for negative-g manoeuvres (which lift the pilot out of the seat); they also require the pilot to un-latch two harnesses if it is necessary to parachute from a failed aircraft.

text: Technology[edit]

text: Locking retractors[edit]

text: The purpose of locking retractors is to provide the seated occupant the convenience of some free movement of the upper torso within the compartment, while providing a method of limiting this movement in the event of a crash. Most modern seat belts are stowed on spring-loaded reels called "retractors" equipped with inertial locking mechanisms that stop the belt from extending off the reel during severe deceleration. There are two main types of inertial seat belt lock. A webbing-sensitive lock is based on a centrifugal clutch activated by rapid acceleration of the strap (webbing) from the reel. The belt can be pulled from the reel only slowly and gradually, as when the occupant extends the belt to fasten it. A sudden rapid pull of the belt—as in a sudden braking or collision event—causes the reel to lock, restraining the occupant in position.

text: A vehicle-sensitive lock is based on a pendulum swung away from its plumb position by rapid deceleration or rollover of the vehicle. In the absence of rapid deceleration or rollover, the reel is unlocked and the belt strap may be pulled from the reel against the spring tension of the reel. The vehicle occupant can move around with relative freedom while the spring tension of the reel keeps the belt taut against the occupant. When the pendulum swings away from its normal plumb position due to sudden deceleration or rollover, a pawl is engaged, the reel locks and the strap restrains the belted occupant in position. Dual-sensing locking retractors use both vehicle G-loading and webbing payout rate to initiate the locking mechanism.

text: Pretensioners and webclamps[edit]

text: Seatbelts in many newer vehicles are also equipped with "pretensioners" or "web clamps", or both.

text: Pretensioners preemptively tighten the belt to prevent the occupant from jerking forward in a crash. Mercedes-Benz first introduced pretensioners on the 1981 S-Class. In the event of a crash, a pretensioner will tighten the belt almost instantaneously. This reduces the motion of the occupant in a violent crash. Like airbags, pretensioners are triggered by sensors in the car's body, and many pretensioners have used explosively expanding gas to drive a piston that retracts the belt. Pretensioners also lower the risk of "submarining", which occurs when a passenger slides forward under a loosely fitted seat belt.

text: Some systems also pre-emptively tighten the belt during fast accelerations and strong decelerations, even if no crash has happened. This has the advantage that it may help prevent the driver from sliding out of position during violent evasive maneuvers, which could cause loss of control of the vehicle. These pre-emptive safety systems may prevent some collisions from happening, as well as reducing injury in the event an actual collision occurs.[26] Pre-emptive systems generally use electric pretensioners which can operate repeatedly and for a sustained period, rather than pyrotechnic pretensioners, which can only operate a single time.

text: Webclamps clamp the webbing in the event of an accident, and limit the distance the webbing can spool out (caused by the unused webbing tightening on the central drum of the mechanism). These belts also often incorporate an energy management loop ("rip stitching") in which a section of the webbing is looped and stitched with a special stitching. The function of this is to "rip" at a predetermined load, which reduces the maximum force transmitted through the belt to the occupant during a violent collision, reducing injuries to the occupant.

text: A study demonstrated that standard automotive 3-point restraints fitted with pyrotechnic or electric pretensioners were not able to eliminate all interior passenger compartment head strikes in rollover test conditions.[27] Electric pretensioners are often incorporated on vehicles equipped with precrash systems; they are designed to reduce seat belt slack in a potential collision and assist in placing the occupants in a more optimal seating position.[28] The electric pretensioners also can operate on a repeated or sustained basis, providing better protection in the event of an extended rollover or a multiple collision accident.

text: Inflatable[edit]

text: The inflatable seatbelt was invented by Donald Lewis and tested at the Automotive Products Division of Allied Chemical Corporation.[29] Inflatable seatbelts have tubular inflatable bladders contained within an outer cover. When a crash occurs the bladder inflates with a gas to increase the area of the restraint contacting the occupant and also shortening the length of the restraint to tighten the belt around the occupant, improving the protection.[30] The inflatable sections may be shoulder-only or lap and shoulder. The system supports the head during the crash better than a web only belt. It also provides side impact protection. In 2013, Ford began offering rear seat inflatable seat belts on a limited set of models, such as the Explorer and Flex.[31]

text: Automatic[edit]

text: Seatbelts that automatically move into position around a vehicle occupant once the adjacent door is closed and/or the engine is started were developed as a countermeasure against low usage rates of manual seat belts, particularly in the United States. The first car to feature automatic shoulder belts as standard equipment was the 1981 Toyota Cressida, but the history of such belts goes back further.[32]

text: The 1972 Volkswagen ESVW1 Experimental Safety Vehicle presented passive seat belts.[33] Volvo tried to develop a passive three point seatbelt. In 1973 Volkswagen announced they had a functional passive seat belt.[34] The first commercial car to use automatic seat belts was the 1975 Volkswagen Golf.[35]

text: Automatic seat belts received a boost in the United States in 1977 when Brock Adams, United States Secretary of Transportation in the Carter Administration, mandated that by 1983 every new car should have either airbags or automatic seat belts[36][37] despite strong lobbying from the auto industry.[38] Adams was attacked by Ralph Nader, who said that the 1983 deadline was too late.[39] Soon after, General Motors began offering automatic seat belts, first on the Chevrolet Chevette,[40][41] but by early 1979 the VW Rabbit and the Chevette were the only cars to offer the safety feature,[39] and GM was reporting disappointing sales.[42] By early 1978, Volkswagen had reported 90,000 Rabbits sold with automatic seat belts.[35] A study released in 1978 by the United States Department of Transportation claimed that cars with automatic seat belts had a fatality rate of .78 per 100 million miles, compared with 2.34 for cars with regular, manual belts.[43]

text: In 1981, Drew Lewis, the first Transportation Secretary of the Reagan Administration, influenced by studies done by the auto industry,[44] "killed"[45] the previous administration's mandate;[46] the decision was overruled in a federal appeals court the following year,[47] and then by the Supreme Court.[45] In 1984, the Reagan Administration reversed its course,[48] though in the meantime the original deadline had been extended; Elizabeth Dole, then Transportation Secretary, proposed that the two passive safety restraints be phased into vehicles gradually, from vehicle model year 1987 to vehicle model year 1990, when all vehicles would be required to have either automatic seat belts or driver side air bags.[45] Though more awkward for vehicle occupants, most manufacturers opted to use less expensive automatic belts rather than airbags during this time period.

text: When driver side airbags became mandatory on all passenger vehicles in model year 1995, most manufacturers stopped equipping cars with automatic seat belts. Exceptions include the 1995-1996 Ford Escort/Mercury Tracer and the Eagle Summit Wagon which had automatic safety belts along with dual airbags.[citation needed]

text: Systems[edit]

text:
Manual lap belt with automatic motorized shoulder belt — When the door is opened, the shoulder belt moves from a fixed point near the seat back on a track mounted in the door frame of the car to a point at the other end of the track near the windshield. Once the door is closed and the car is started, the belt moves rearward along the track to its original position, thus securing the passenger. The lap belt must be fastened manually.
Manual lap belt with automatic non-motorized shoulder belt — This system was used in American-market vehicles such as the Hyundai Excel and Volkswagen Jetta. The shoulder belt is fixed to the aft upper corner of the vehicle door, and is not motorized. The lap belt must be fastened manually.
Automatic shoulder and lap belts — This system was mainly used in General Motors vehicles, though it was also used on some Honda Civic hatchbacks and Nissan Sentra coupés. When the door is opened, the belts go from a fixed point in the middle of the car by the floor to retractors on the door. Passengers must slide into the car under the belts. When the door closes, the seat belt retracts into the door. The belts have normal release buttons that are supposed to be used only in an emergency, but in practice are routinely used in the same manner as manual seat belt clasps.[citation needed]

text: Disadvantages[edit]

text: Automatic belt systems generally offer inferior occupant crash protection.[49][50] In systems with belts attached to the door rather than a sturdier fixed portion of the vehicle body, a crash that causes the vehicle door to open leaves the occupant without belt protection. In such a scenario, the occupant may be thrown from the vehicle and suffer greater injury or death.[50]

text: Because many automatic belt system designs compliant with the US passive-restraint mandate did not meet the safety performance requirements of Canada—which were not weakened to accommodate automatic belts—vehicle models which had been eligible for easy importation in either direction across the US-Canada border when equipped with manual belts became ineligible for importation in either direction once the U.S. variants obtained automatic belts and the Canadian versions retained manual belts. Two particular models included the Dodge Spirit and Plymouth Acclaim.[51][52]

text: Automatic belt systems also present several operational disadvantages. Motorists who would normally wear seat belts must still fasten the manual lap belt, thus rendering redundant the automation of the shoulder belt. Those who do not fasten the lap belt wind up inadequately protected only by the shoulder belt; in a crash without a lap belt such a vehicle occupant is likely to "submarine" (be thrown forward under the shoulder belt) and be seriously injured. Motorized or door-affixed shoulder belts hinder access to the vehicle, making it difficult to enter and exit—particularly if the occupant is carrying items such as a box or a purse. Vehicle owners tend to disconnect the motorized or door-affixed shoulder belt to relieve the nuisance of entering and exiting the vehicle, leaving only a lap belt for crash protection. Also, many automatic seat belt systems are incompatible with child safety seats, or only compatible with special modifications.

text: Homologation and testing[edit]

text: Starting in 1971 and ending in 1972, the United States conducted a research project on seat belt effectiveness on a total of 40,000 vehicle occupants using car accident reports collected during that time. Of these 40,000 occupants, 18% were reported wearing lap belts, or two-point safety belts, 2% were reported wearing a three-point safety belt, and the remaining 80% was reported as wearing no safety belt. The results concluded that users of the two-point lap belt had a 73% lower fatality rate, a 53% lower serious injury rate, and a 38% lower injury rate, when compared with the occupants that were reported unrestrained. Similarly, users of the three-point safety belt had a 60% lower serious injury rate and a 41% lower rate of all other injuries. Out of the 2% described as wearing a three-point safety belt, no fatalities were reported.[53]

text: This study and others led to the Restraint Systems Evaluation Program (RSEP), started by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in 1975 to increase the reliability and authenticity of past studies. A study as part of this program used data taken from 15,000 tow-away accidents that involved only car models made between 1973 and 1975. The study found that for injuries considered “moderate” or worse, individuals wearing a three-point safety belt had a 56.5% lower injury rate than those wearing no safety belt. The study also concluded that the effectiveness of the safety belt did not differ with size of car.[53] It was determined that the variation among results of the many studies conducted in the 1960s and 70s was due to the use of different methodologies, and could not be attributed to any significant variation in the effectiveness of safety belts.[54]

text: Helping to improve safety apparatuses in vehicles, injury testing, and seat belt effectiveness are being tested today by Wayne State University’s Automotive Safety Research Group, as well as other researchers.[55] Wayne State’s Bioengineering Center uses human cadavers in their crash test research. Albert King, the Center’s director, wrote in his 1995 article titled "Humanitarian Benefits of Cadaver Research on Injury Prevention” that that use of cadavers in this type of research since 1987 has saved and will continue to save nearly 8,500 lives each year, due to the vehicle safety improvements made possible by human cadaver testing. He also indicates that due to the improvements made to three-point safety belts an average of 61 lives are saved per year.[56]

text: The New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) was put in place by the United States National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in 1979. The NCAP is a government program that evaluates vehicle safety designs and sets standards for foreign and domestic automobile companies. The agency has put in place a rating system and requires access to safety test results. As of September 2007[update], manufacturers are required to place a NCAP star rating on the automobile price sticker.[57]

text: Experimental[edit]

text: Research and development efforts are ongoing to improve the safety performance of vehicle seatbelts. Some experimental designs have included:

text:
Criss-cross Experimental safety belt presented in the Volvo SCC. It forms a cross-brace across the chest.[24]
3+2 Point Seatbelt: Experimental safety belt from Autoliv similar to the criss-cross. The 3+2 improves protection against rollovers and side impacts.[58]
Four point "belt and suspenders": An experimental design from Ford where the "suspenders" are attached to the backrest, not to the frame of the car.[59]
3 points Adjustable Seatbelt: Experimental safety belt from GWR Safety Systems that allowed the car Hiriko, designed by the MIT, to fold without compromising the safety and comfort of the occupants.[60]

text: In rear seats[edit]

text: This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (June 2014)

text: In 1955 (as a 1956 package), Ford offered lap only seat belts in the rear seats as an option within the Lifeguard safety package. In 1967, Volvo started to install lap belts in the rear seats. In 1972, Volvo upgraded the rear seat belts to a three-point belt.[61]

text: In crashes, unbelted rear passengers increase the risk of belted front seat occupants' death by nearly five times.[62][63]

text: Child occupants[edit]

text: As with adult drivers and passengers, the advent of seat belts was accompanied by calls for their use by child occupants, including legislation requiring such use. Generally children using adult seat belts suffer significantly lower injury risk when compared to non-buckled children.

text: The UK extended compulsory seatbelt wearing to child passengers under the age of 14 in 1989. It was observed that this measure was accompanied by a 10% increase in fatalities and a 12% increase in injuries among the target population.[64] In crashes, small children who wear adult seatbelts can suffer "seat-belt syndrome" injuries including severed intestines, ruptured diaphragms and spinal damage. There is also research suggesting that children in inappropriate restraints are at significantly increased risk of head injury,[65] one of the authors of this research has been quoted as claiming that: "The early graduation of kids into adult lap and shoulder belts is a leading cause of child-occupant injuries and deaths."[66]

text: As a result of such findings, many jurisdictions now advocate or require child passengers to use specially designed child restraints. Such systems include separate child-sized seats with their own restraints and booster cushions for children using adult restraints. In some jurisdictions children below a certain size are forbidden to travel in front car seats."[67]

text: Reminder chime and light[edit]

text: In Europe and some other parts of the world, most modern cars include a seat-belt reminder light for the driver and some also include a reminder for the passenger, when present, activated by a pressure sensor under the passenger seat. Some cars will intermittently flash the reminder light and sound the chime until the driver (and sometimes the front passenger, if present) fasten their seatbelts.[68]

text: In North America, cars sold since the early 1970s[vague] have included an audiovisual reminder system consisting of a tell-tale light on the dashboard and a buzzer or chime reminding the driver and passengers to fasten their belts. Originally, these lights were accompanied by a warning buzzer whenever the transmission was in any position except park[clarification needed] if either the driver was not buckled up or, as determined by a pressure sensor in the passenger's seat, if there was a passenger there not buckled up.[citation needed] However, this was considered by many to be a major annoyance, as the light would be on and the buzzer would sound continuously if front-seat passengers were not buckled up. Therefore, people who did not wish to buckle up would defeat this system by fastening the seat belts with the seat empty and leaving them that way.[citation needed]

text: To combat this dangerous habit, in 1971[citation needed] NHTSA amended Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard № 208 (FMVSS 208) to require a seat belt/starter interlock system to prevent passenger cars from being started with an unbelted front-seat occupant. This mandate applied to passenger cars built after August 1973, i.e., starting with the 1974 model year. The specifications required the system to permit the car to be started only if the belt of an occupied seat were fastened after the occupant sat down, so pre-buckling the belts would not defeat the system.[69][70] The interlock systems used logic modules complex enough to require special diagnostic computers, and were not entirely dependable—an override button was provided under the hood of equipped cars, permitting one (but only one) "free" starting attempt each time it was pressed.[71] However, the interlock system spurred severe backlash from an American public who largely rejected seat belts. In 1974, Congress acted to prohibit NHTSA from requiring or permitting a system that prevents a vehicle from starting or operating with an unbelted occupant, or that gives an audible warning of an unfastened belt for more than 8 seconds after the ignition is turned on.[70] This prohibition took effect on 27 October 1974, shortly after the 1975 model year began.[72]

text: In response to the Congressional action, NHTSA once again amended FMVSS 208, requiring vehicles to come with a seat belt reminder system that gives an audible signal for 4 to 8 seconds and a warning light for at least 60 seconds after the ignition is turned on if the driver's seat belt is not fastened.[70] This is called a seat belt reminder (SBR) system. In the mid-1990s, an insurance company from Sweden called Folksam worked with Saab and Ford to determine the requirements for the most efficient seat belt reminder. One characteristic of the optimal SBR, according to the research, is that the audible warning becomes increasingly penetrating the longer the seat belt remains unfastened.[73]

text: In 2003, the Transportation Research Board Committee, chaired by two psychologists, reported that ESBRs could save an additional 1,000 lives a year.[74] Research by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety found that Ford's ESBR, which provides an intermittent chime for up to five minutes if the driver is unbelted, sounding for 6 seconds then pausing for 30, increased seat belt use by 5 percent.[74] Farmer and Wells found that driver fatality rates were 6% lower for vehicles with ESBR compared with otherwise-identical vehicles without.[75]

text: Efficacy[edit]

text: In 2001, Congress directed NHSTA to study the benefits of technology meant to increase the use of seat belts. NHSTA found that seat belt usage had increased to 73% since the initial introduction of the SBR system.[70] In 2002, Ford demonstrated that seat belts were used more in Fords with seat belt reminders than in those without: 76% and 71% respectively. In 2007, Honda conducted a similar study and found that 90% of people who drove Hondas with seat belt reminders used a seat belt, while 84% of people who drove Hondas without seat belt reminders used a seat belt.[73]

text: Legislation[edit]

text: Observational studies of car crash morbidity and mortality,[76][77][78] experiments using both crash test dummies and human cadavers indicate that wearing seat belts greatly reduces the risk of death and injury in the majority of car crashes.

text: This has led many countries to adopt mandatory seat belt wearing laws. It is generally accepted that, in comparing like-for-like accidents, a vehicle occupant not wearing a properly fitted seat belt has a significantly and substantially higher chance of death and serious injury. One large observation studying using US data showed that the odds ratio of crash death is 0.46 with a three-point belt, when compared with no belt.[79] In another study that examined injuries presenting to the ER pre- and post-seat belt law introduction, it was found that 40% more escaped injury and 35% more escaped mild and moderate injuries.[80]

text: The effects of seat belt laws are disputed by those who observe that their passage did not reduce road fatalities. There was also concern that instead of legislating for a general protection standard for vehicle occupants, laws that required a particular technical approach would rapidly become dated as motor manufacturers would tool up for a particular standard which could not easily be changed. For example, in 1969 there were competing designs for lap and 3-point seat belts, rapidly tilting seats, and air bags being developed. But as countries started to mandate seat belt restraints the global auto industry invested in the tooling and standardized exclusively on seat belts, and ignored other restraint designs such as air bags for several decades[81]

text: As of 2016, seat belt laws can be divided into two categories: primary and secondary. A primary seat belt law allows an officer to issue a citation for lack of seatbelt use without any other citation, whereas a secondary seat belt law allows an officer to issue a seat belt citation only in the presence of a different violation. In the United States, fifteen states enforce secondary laws, while 34 states, as well as the District of Columbia, American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, enforce primary seat belt laws. New Hampshire lacks both a primary and secondary seat belt law.[82]

text: Risk compensation[edit]

text: Some have proposed that the number of deaths was influenced by the development of risk compensation, which says that drivers adjust their behavior in response to the increased sense of personal safety wearing a seat belt provides.

text: In one trial subjects were asked to drive go-karts around a track under various conditions. It was found that subjects who started driving unbelted drove consistently faster when subsequently belted.[83] Similarly, a study of habitual non-seatbelt wearers driving in freeway conditions found evidence that they had adapted to seatbelt use by adopting higher driving speeds and closer following distances.[84] A 2001 analysis of US crash data aimed to establish the effects of seatbelt legislation on driving fatalities[85] and found that previous estimates of seatbelts effectiveness had been significantly overstated. According to the analysis used, seatbelts were claimed to have decreased fatalities by 1.35% for each 10% increase in seatbelt use. The study controlled for endogenous motivations of seat belt use, which it is claimed creates an artificial correlation between seat belt use and fatalities, leading to the conclusion that seatbelts cause fatalities. For example, drivers in high risk areas are more likely to use seat belts, and are more likely to be in accidents, creating a non-causal correlation between seatbelt use and mortality. After accounting for the endogeneity of seatbelt usage, Cohen and Einav found no evidence that the risk compensation effect makes seatbelt wearing drivers more dangerous, a finding at variance with other research.

text: Increased traffic[edit]

text: Other statistical analyses have included adjustments for factors such as increased traffic, and other factors such as age, and based on these adjustments, a reduction of morbidity and mortality due to seat belt use has been claimed.[76] However, Smeed's law predicts a fall in accident rate with increasing car ownership and has been demonstrated independently of seat belt legislation.

text: Mass transit considerations[edit]

text: Buses[edit]

text: School buses[edit]

text: In the US, six states—California, Florida, Louisiana, New Jersey, New York, and Texas—require seat belts on school buses.[86]

text: Pros[87][88][89] and cons[90][91][92] had been alleged about the use of seatbelts in school buses. School buses which are much bigger in size than the average vehicle allow for the mass transportation of students from place to place. The American School Bus Council states in a brief article saying that, “The children are protected like eggs in an egg carton – compartmentalized, and surrounded with padding and structural integrity to secure the entire container.” (ASBC). Although school buses are considered safe for mass transit of students this will not guarantee that the students will be injury free if an impact were to occur. Seatbelts in buses are sometimes believed to make recovering from a roll or tip harder for students and staff as they could be easily trapped in their own safety belt.[93]

text: In 2015, for the first time, NHTSA endorsed seat belts on school buses.[94]

text: Motor coaches[edit]

text: In the European Union, all new long distance buses and coaches must be fitted with seat belts.[95]

text: Australia has required lap/sash seat belts in new coaches since 1994. These must comply with Australian Design Rule 68, which requires the seat belt, seat and seat anchorage to withstand 20g deceleration and an impact by an unrestrained occupant to the rear.[96]

text: In the United States, NHTSA has now required lap-shoulder seat belts in new "over-the-road" buses (includes most coaches) starting in 2016.[97]

text: Trains[edit]

text: The use of seatbelts in trains has been investigated. Concerns about survival space intrusion in train crashes and increased injuries to unrestrained or incorrectly restrained passengers led the researchers to discourage the use of seat belts in trains.

text: Airplanes[edit]

text: Lap belts are found on all passenger aircraft. Many civil aviation authorities require a "fasten seat belt" sign in passenger aircraft that can be activated by a pilot during takeoff, turbulence, and landing.[99][100] The International Civil Aviation Organization recommends the use of child restraints.[101]