Carl Cyrus Clark, an internationally known expert on human
acceleration and crash protection whose research contributed
significantly to the development of air bags for automobiles and
airplanes, died of a heart attack Thursday at his summer home in
Thetford, Vt. The longtime Catonsville resident was 82. "The
bottom line in discussing Carl Clark is that people are safer
because of his work. He did more for humanity than 99.9 percent
of the world's scientists," consumer advocate Ralph Nader said
yesterday. "As a scientist, he had tremendous range and he
thought there wasn't a technical problem that he couldn't
understand and elucidate. He was one of the most creative
scientists I've ever known," Mr. Nader said. "We have safer
highways today because of Carl. He was a fantastically
interesting person who was chock-full of ideas and incredibly
persistent," said Joan Claybrook, former head of the National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration, who brought Dr. Clark to
the agency in 1971. "He was very upbeat and ha