Volvo's latest safety system alerts the driver and brakes the car for animals in the road.
The new technology uses the same cameras and sensors as Volvo's Pedestrian Detection with Full Auto Brake system and will be available on new cars in a few years time. Apparently, to help identify animals, the engineers spent an evening in a safari park filming moose and deer. When a large animal is detected in the road an audible warning will sound and, if the driver fails to react, the brakes will be applied to reduce the impact speed.
Is this something we should be concerned about? Volvo says that in Sweden there are more than 40,000 accidents reported every year that involve wild animals. In particular there is a danger that a large animal will roll over the bonnet and into the windscreen.
Work on the system has been underway for a year. More development is required so that it can 'learn' to recognise animals and on the decision making software.
Mitigating the effects of collisions with animals is part of a wider strategy that, by 2020, no-one should be seriously injured or killed in a new Volvo.