Ford, in a hasty reaction to some questionable advice given by Carrie Underwood in that song you jokingly sing when you almost crash your car (LOL), is developing an automatic collision prevention system that will help you steer your car out of the way of a crash.
Jesus take the wheel / Take it from my hands / Cause I can’t do this on my own / I’m letting go…
Horrible advice. But maybe there are some situations in which those of you who are paying attention, and not “letting go” (0f the steering wheel) just can not brake in time to avoid a collision. In that case, Ford has a new solution its developing called “Evasive Steering Assist.”
The new system Ford is still developing isn’t exactly “Jesus” or any other entity “taking” the wheel from the driver. Instead it’s better described as aiding and amplifying the driver’s input.
If the car detects a potential collision ahead of the car and decides that there isn’t enough braking distance between the object and the car, it will steer the car into an area it detects to be clear if and only if the driver begins to steer themselves.
So basically, if the car senses it can’t stop in time, and the driver jerks the wheel to swerve out of the way, the car will take over, safely execute the swerve, and apply full brakes to mitigate the chances of hitting anything.
Of course there’s a lot of dangerous math that the system will need to run through to calculate the best route to guide the car based on the available space. One step closer to that common dilemma of who the machines decide to kill when they’re in control of cars.
But this system is better than no system, and if it can prevent more crashes and prevent more deaths, it’s definitely a worthy development. We’ll have to trust our cars with decisions one day soon enough.