Illinois Car and Truck Accident Lawyer Blog

Companies like Intel may benefit from “Toyota’s woes with recalls and mysterious acceleration problems.” (J. Quain, NYTimes, 7/7). Intel, for example, has a black box on the horizon that could potentially take the mystery out of many car accidents.

Congress is pushing for event recorders, or black boxes, to be installed in all new vehicles as part of a piece of legislation propelled by the Toyota acceleration issue. As part of the system, “Intel’s event recorder would be able to record basic telemetry of the vehicle and information like whether the seat belts were being used at the time of an accident, and a whole lot more.”

Combining video capabilities with GPS technology would allow the Intel event recorder to know exactly where and when an accident occurred and have up to 30 seconds of video to help piece everything together.

The event recorder “would also be tied directly into a car’s existing computer control modules, so that investigators would know when or if the brakes were applied, for example, or if there was some mechanical malfunction.” Moreover, sophisticated vision systems create the potential for an external camera to know what a traffic signal was at the time of impact or whether the driver disregarded any important roadside signs.

The technological possibilities are seemingly endless, but costs will likely limit the technology that can be required for use. However, as GPS and drowsy driver warning systems are already standard in many vehicles, much of the hardware cost is already included in the vehicle. As a car and truck accident lawyer in Chicago, I am intrigued by the seemingly endless possibilities and am hopeful that the technology will be both effective and affordable.