This was posted at another board regarding their grandsons car accident. I didn't want to copy and paste since it looked like a personal post that one of my friends was given permission to post on a journal blog. So I left it at her site.

copy and paste the following link.
http://www.cafemom.com/journals/read.php?post_id=1251143&commented=1#comments

By Dawnk777 on Monday, October 13, 2008 - 03:34 pm:

Would a 34-pound, 39" boy fit in a rear-facing seat?? That seems so big. I see what happened, with him being forward facing.

My kids were both forward-facing at about a year. There wasn't such a push to keep them rear-facing, back then (early-to-mid 90's.)

By Trina~moderator on Monday, October 13, 2008 - 04:57 pm:

The current push is to keep kids rear facing until they outgrow the rear facing limits of their convertible car seat. Many convertibles now go up to 30-35 lbs. Rear facing better protects the head, neck and spine during a crash. The very bare minimum requirements for turning babies forward facing are 12 mos. and 20 lbs, but keeping them rear facing longer is even better.

Expert Statements confirm that rear-facing is safest.