Tactical threat assessor for a vehicle

• Main Authors: Vilay Patel, David A Herman, Chuck Michael Broadwater, Nicholas Colella
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 05.04.2017
• Subjects: ANALOGOUS ARRANGEMENTS USING OTHER WAVES; DETERMINING DISTANCE OR VELOCITY BY USE OF RADIO WAVES; GYROSCOPIC INSTRUMENTS; LOCATING OR PRESENCE-DETECTING BY USE OF THE REFLECTION ORRERADIATION OF RADIO WAVES; MEASURING; MEASURING DISTANCES, LEVELS OR BEARINGS; NAVIGATION; PHOTOGRAMMETRY OR VIDEOGRAMMETRY; PHYSICS; RADIO DIRECTION-FINDING; RADIO NAVIGATION; SIGNALLING; SURVEYING; TESTING; TRAFFIC CONTROL SYSTEMS

A vehicle 22 comprises a controller (20,Fig.1) and sensors for detecting objects in zones (62-72,Fig.2) adjacent the vehicle. The controller generates a collision alert which may include a directional prompt in response to the vehicle approaching a path 94 defining a next turn of a navigational route 92 and a vehicle 102 being detected in a subset 70 of the detection zones selected to be on a same side of the vehicle as the turn direction. The alert may be generated in response to the vehicle being at a threshold distance, or travel time, from the next turn. The collision alert and directional prompt may be auditory or visual, such as a red circle (258,Fig5) or overlay (262,Fig6) on an arrow. The controller may pin guidance flags to the navigational route to mark a second distance closer to the next turn than the first distance, and delay issuing prompts until the second distance if no vehicles are found in the relevant zones. This improves navigation systems by providing collision warnings in connection with directions to reduce the risk of accidents.