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Comment by douche | Hacker News Reader

BTW, the original paper is about Cervus Elpaphus, which in the US we call Red Deer. This is different from American Elk, and also from Scandanavian Elk (which we Americans call Moose).

Moose are terrifying, since they are often upwards of 1000 pounds, and are tall enough that when you hit them with anything smaller than a full-size pickup or tractor trailer, they tend to fall on the roof and windscreen of the vehicle, crushing them and killing the passengers.

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I agree that confusion exists, but I don't think you have the details quite correct. In North America, I think the term "Red Deer" is only used to describe non-native animals. The paper says its about Cervus elaphus, but the study was done in Alberta, Canada. The native animals that are hunted in Alberta are locally called Elk and the provincial government says they are synonymous with Wapiti: http://aep.alberta.ca/fish-wildlife/wild-species/mammals/dee....

I think the missing pieces of information is that Wapiti (Cervus canadensis) was until recently classified as a subspecies of Cervus elaphus. I'm guessing that the authors of the paper (and the provincial government) either don't agree with this reclassification, or have some legal reason for continuing to refer to the native North American animals by the older Latin name.

Hmm. I'm in Norway this week, but I live in Montana. We have Moose in our yard at home. There are stuffed Moose in the museums here (labeled "Moose"). They're the same animal.

I grew up in Scotland where we have Red Deer. Those animals are roughy the same thing as a North American Elk.

Ah..

Anyway, I think Volvo addressed this problem by

a) reinforcing particularly the A pillars using some very strong Boron steel alloy:

http://135jik1bbhst1159ri1ax2pj.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-c...

b) angling the A pillars/front screen more in order to deflect some of the forces caused by a direct collision with a Moose.

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