This has been a long standing debate as far as I can remember.

The conclusion has always been linked to a vehicle's structural integrity with the appropriate passenger restraint systems. In the video feature above, we saw no less than a Volvo, supposedly one of the safest vehicles in the world, figure in this disturbing outcome.

So it is easy to see that build quality and proper design is always the bottomline to vehicle's crashworthiness, not the eminent heft.