I think you hit on an important point when you mentioned automotive crash tests. In cases like testing a new car it’s simply too complex for us to biuld a predictive model. So we do destructive testing. As an old boss of mine was fond of saying “the best way to see how something will break is to break a shitlod of 'em.”
I’ve workied in plants that made industrial pipe fittings and flanges and it was not uncommon to burt test them, run up the pressure untill something ruptured.
I worked in a plant that made electical switches - the kind that flip over to emergency generator power in an instant for places like operating rooms where losing power really isn’t an option. We’d overlod the hell out of those things and throw the switch - makes quite a boom and flash and we’d spend the next few days picking up parts and reassembling the thing. That was fun.
The point is predictive testing can only get so complicated.