There are usually two kinds of accidents related to vehicles and water, one is falling into the water and the other is wading.
There were many accidents before the vehicle fell into the water, such as Chongqing bus crash into the river on June 28th, 20th18, Gaoyou bus crash into the river on June 28th, 20th18, and Hanzhong bus crash into the river on February 6th, 20th19.
Moreover, wading accidents are often accompanied by heavy rains and floods. On July 20 12, in the rainstorm in Beijing, the owner of a vehicle wading in water drowned. Every year in typhoon and flood season, low-lying sections and culverts are high-risk areas for wading accidents. Especially recently, most parts of the country have fallen into the rainy season, and cars in many cities have become "boats". Optimists joke that it makes sense to collect "travel tax".
Every accident has its complicated reasons, and I have seen so many wading accidents. I suddenly had an idea: Now that technology is so advanced, why can't cars be made waterproof?
Completely waterproof, realizable and unrealistic.
It is not impossible to make the vehicle completely waterproof. Many armored vehicles in service can be waded. An American armored vehicle can sink 10 ~ 15 seconds in a wave 3.5 meters high. But obviously, ordinary passenger cars can't be as waterproof as armored vehicles, and the cost difference is more than one order of magnitude.
At the 2008 Geneva International Auto Show, the famous Swiss sports car manufacturer "Rin-speed" launched the world's first amphibious concept car Squba. The top speed of this convertible is 124 km on the highway, about 5 km on the water, about 3 km under the water, and the maximum diving depth is1m.
Instead of using an internal combustion engine, this car uses three motors, one is responsible for driving on the road, and the other two drive the screw propeller at the rear, which together with the jet propeller at the front provide power for driving in the water. The body of nano-carbon fiber makes the whole vehicle weigh less than one ton, which is very light. But the car body is not closed, and passengers need to use oxygen tanks like divers (seeing this, I can't help but ask, what is the significance of this submersible car? )
This car can be said to be a luxury toy, and it can't provide much technical reference for the accident of vehicle falling into the water. And the high cost is doomed to mass production.
In recent years, there are rumors that car companies want to develop aquada, and Tesla is very enthusiastic about this idea. However, considering the cost and market prospect, amphibious vehicles should only stay in concept for a short time.
The wading ability can be improved and the price is expensive.
Improving the wading ability is the simplest and rudest way to solve the wading distress of vehicles. Babos, the royal refitter of Mercedes-Benz, once launched a model-Brabus? G550. The maximum wading distance of this vehicle can reach 1 m, which can resist most wading risks. But this car is not only more than 6 million, but also limited in the world.
Land Rover with outstanding off-road capability has a unique technology called wading induction system. The ultrasonic sensor on the lower side of the exterior rearview mirror can monitor the distance between the rearview mirror and the water surface, and its self-developed wading induction control unit Wade? Sensing will display the information on the central control panel after calculating the wading depth, and give an alarm when the wading depth reaches the maximum.
However, this configuration itself is expensive, and most of them are carried on high-end models. In reality, many people are reluctant to buy water-related insurance, and only a few people are interested in this configuration.
Accident prevention focuses on the management of drivers.
Can drowning and wading accidents be prevented from the source? In addition to the wading warning function mentioned above, the existing prevention mechanism in this respect is really limited. The scene of the wading accident is relatively simple, and the driver's subjective safety awareness can actually be avoided, but it is much more complicated to prevent falling into the water.
There is essentially no difference between a car falling into the water and a general traffic accident. Nothing more than other accidents on land. The car accident happened near the water surface, causing the car to fall into the water. Therefore, preventing cars from falling into the water is essentially to prevent traffic accidents.
The Chongqing 10 28 bus crashed into the river, because the passenger and the driver had a dispute and grabbed the steering wheel, which caused the vehicle to run out of control and fall into the river. In recent years, in order to prevent passengers from interfering with drivers, many buses have installed isolation doors to prevent this from happening again. This method is relatively the simplest.
It is much more complicated to deal with the driver's fatigue driving out of the road and bridge, and the sudden physical problems of the driver lead to the loss of control of the vehicle. In recent years, we have seen many reports that bus drivers pulled over with their last strength when they had a heart attack, thus avoiding the life of a bus passenger being threatened. Can this sudden illness of drivers be prevented?
Heinrich, a famous American safety engineer, put forward a famous rule: behind a major accident, there must be 29 minor accidents and 300 potential hidden dangers. This rule has been adopted by many insurance companies and enterprises. If we follow this rule, there are actually many hidden dangers behind the accidents we know.
Driver health monitoring system should be the best solution to this problem, and car companies have been developing it for many years. As early as 20 15, Ford applied for a patent called "medical data collection and reporting", which uses sensors to monitor the health status of drivers in real time and can contact medical personnel in case of emergency.
In the early years, Ford also developed a smart seat. Six sensors were implanted in the seat to monitor heart attacks by reading heartbeat signals, and to warn drivers at the early stage of the disease. Later, due to the rise of wearable technology, the cost is cheaper and the data is more accurate. Ford abandoned the project.
Audi Health Driver System monitors heart rate and body temperature through a bracelet or watch to judge whether the driver is tired, stressed or in poor health.
Volvo, which has always been focusing on safety cards, launched a car camera in 20 19, which can judge the driver's blood sugar level by observing the pupil, and call relatives or hospitals as soon as they find their physical condition.
Concept cars of Toyota, Honda, Lexus and other brands are also equipped with various systems, which can identify the driver's emotional, heartbeat, body temperature and other physiological information. In-vehicle health monitoring system of Great Wall, a domestic brand, uses 77GHz millimeter wave radar to monitor human body fretting to monitor heart rate and respiration.
It can be seen that in the feasible dimension, car companies have not given up trying to improve car safety. However, in addition to the cost and difficulty of research and development, the configuration of airborne health system also involves ethical and legal issues such as privacy. There is still a long way to go for the maturity and popularization of this configuration.
Policy-oriented, the future can be expected
In 20 18, the Ministry of Communications issued a document requesting that intelligent video monitoring and alarm devices be installed on the existing three types of passenger cars, tourist chartered cars, dangerous goods road transport vehicles, rural passenger vehicles and heavy operating trucks, and in front of the new "two passengers and one danger" vehicles entering the road transport market, so as to realize automatic identification and real-time alarm of drivers' unsafe driving behavior.
In 20 17, the European Association for New Car Safety Assessment (Europe -NCAP) listed driver monitoring as the main safety system. From 2020, only vehicles with driver monitoring function can obtain EU five-star safety certification.
It is not difficult to see from the policy orientation that it is a general trend to monitor drivers, and with the maturity of this technology, perhaps all kinds of vehicle accidents caused by drivers' subjective and objective reasons can be prevented and controlled. Accidents on the road may be difficult to prevent, but there is hope for managing drivers well.
Finally?
In traffic accidents, the biggest factor is often people. No matter how advanced the safety configuration is, it is impossible to surpass people to take over the vehicle at this stage. The system provides more help for drivers, and it is still people who play a key role in the accident. We expect the development of science and technology to bring more advanced and safer configurations to automobiles, and at the same time, we should pay more attention to drivers' attention. As the Ministry of Public Security emphasized in the bulletin on bus accidents in Guizhou on July 8, strengthening daily safety precautions and optimizing emergency preparedness are the most effective preventive measures for such accidents at this stage.
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