By Kia officially introduced the fourth-generation Carnival in October 2020. The new model has been already on sale in many countries including Australia and New Zealand. Now ANCAP (Australian New Car Assessment Program) crash-tested the new-generation Carnival and scored a full-five star rating. The Kia Carnival was introduced in Australia and New Zealand in January 2021 and the safety rating applies to all variants.
The Carnival also provides a well-rounded safety specification, offering head-protecting airbags and intelligent seatbelt reminders for all three seating rows, autonomous emergency braking, active lane keeping, and fatigue monitoring as standard. The Carnival performed particularly well for Adult Occupant Protection, with maximum points scored in the side impact and oblique pole tests, and good scores in the challenging MPDB frontal offset and full-width frontal tests. Maximum points were also awarded for Child Occupant Protection (COP) in the frontal offset and side impact tests.
As part of ANCAP’s COP assessment, the ability to safely install and accommodate a range of typical child restraints is also evaluated – an important consideration given the Carnival is likely to be used by families with a number of young children. The Carnival is fitted with top tether and ISOFix anchorages for five of its six rear seating positions, giving owners a wide range of options for the installation of child restraints.
The child restraint installation assessment revealed that most restraints could be fitted safely in these locations, however it was noted that one of the Type A convertible restraints could not be correctly installed in rearward-facing mode using the ISOFix anchorages in the second-row outboard seats or the third seating row. In addition, the fitting of any child restraint in the third row centre position is not recommended due to the lack of top tether and ISOFix anchorages in that location. Notably, performance testing of the autonomous emergency braking (AEB) system showed very good results with collisions avoided or mitigated in all vehicle-to-vehicle test scenarios. Similarly, the Carnival’s ability to detect and react to pedestrians was Good, while cyclist detection was rated as Adequate.
