The sirens on ambulances and emergency vehicles are designed to be loud so that drivers who are far away can hear it and get ready to move out of the way. However sometimes some drivers love putting their music on full blast and are blissfully unaware that an ambulance is trying to get in front of them.
In a life or death situation where every second count, this can be deadly. However oven in Stockholm, Sweden, students have come up with an interesting way to make sure that every driver will know that an ambulance is headed their way. This is done by creating a system that basically “hijacks” the radio of the car to deliver a warning message that an emergency vehicle is on its way.
What makes this system even better is the fact that it does not require the driver to own any fancy new technology, as long as they have a radio with an FM tuner (we guess Norway won’t be adopting that system) that is equipped with Radio Data System. The signal is sent over the FM band along with a text message that is displayed on the tuner’s display.
By sending the signal early, drivers can prepare to move their cars out of the way. The students’ project will be adopted by emergency vehicles and will enter into a testing phase in Q1 2017. Of course this relies on the user having the tuner turned on, but we guess if the tuner is off you should be able to hear those sirens anyway.
Filed in . Read more about Radio.