Mechanical shock resistant MEMS accelerometer arrangement, associated method, apparatus and system

An accelerometer arrangement configured for determining accelerations of a device along three at least generally orthogonal axes in a mechanical shock and vibration environment, said accelerometer arrangement comprising:

• a first MEMS accelerometer package and a second MEMS accelerometer package, each of which includes one or more sensing axes such that the first and second MEMS accelerometer packages collectively provide a total of at least four sensing axes for sensing along the three orthogonal axes and at least one of the first MEMS accelerometer package and the second MEMS accelerometer package includes one sensing axis that is weaker than another sensing axis of that MEMS accelerometer package in being more susceptible to mechanical shock and vibration with the first MEMS accelerometer package and the second MEMS accelerometer package supported such that the weaker axis of one accelerometer package is redundant with respect to another sensing axis in the other MEMS accelerometer package;
• a processor that is configured to select a combination of three sensing axes outputs from the total number of sensing axes to determine the accelerations along said three orthogonal axes without using the weaker sensing axis for determining said accelerations.