Autobreak devices aren’t foolproof, particularly at night: Roadshow

Q: It is certainly incredible that so lots of individuals are so completely unaware of the potential risks of not paying out attention to targeted visitors, primarily at night.

The other night when we have been in the car and my wife was driving, she experienced to slam on the brakes and arrived within just inches, pretty much, of hitting a male on a bicycle on The Alameda.

That segment of The Alameda is dim, and the bicycle owner was carrying all dark-colored apparel, wore no helmet, and experienced no gentle or reflectors on his bike. He appeared out of the blue, out of nowhere, from the left facet of the street, and was riding really rapid, crossing the avenue. He didn’t even glance, until he read the tires on our car skidding.

Thank God for my wife’s brief response. Had there been an accident at our velocity of 40 mph, it could have been fatal for the bicyclist.

Chuck Dougherty, San Jose

A: Here’s some disconcerting information about night driving, which is specifically consequential for pedestrians and bicyclists. Pedestrian fatalities have soared nearly 80 % because their lowest degree in 2009, with three-quarters of these deaths occurring at evening.

Whilst autobrakes are normally productive in preventing crashes, new investigate shows that this technological know-how isn’t as powerful in darkish problems. An essential element of the trouble is that lots of vehicles analyzed did not have headlights that detected pedestrians in time to prevent a crash.

To tackle the higher percentage of pedestrian crashes that arise on dim roadways, the Coverage Institute for Highway Protection just lately started off a nighttime examination of pedestrian computerized crisis braking (AEB) techniques.