Ambulance Sound Detector

Projects General Guidance
24

Well, any response is arguably better than zero.

Right now in your vehicle, you're unaware that there's an emergency vehicle 90 degrees from you behind a building. You have the green light.

Any degree of failure as long as you get some success is better than nothing at all which is what you have now.

Most emergency vehicles use the same tones, they're all high, they're all loud. Modulated. If your microphone can hear it around the corner, beep and flash an LED on your dash, you know they're coming, you have a shot.

Finding reasons why it doesn't work or why you think it wouldn't work, specially if they're not technical and blame folks and stupidity, is not why I'm here.

Thanks!

27

I think someone has already posted the much better solution, some sort of device that allows the emergency responders to set the traffic lights all to red so everyone stops when they are coming.

And that's been around since 1980 to my personal knowledge, and possibly longer. (Although that's for settings where there are traffic lights of course, and that's not always the case.)

I like the Rumbler, which you feel literally through the seat of your pants, and your feet through the floorboard / pedals and hands through the wheel.

But as others have pointed out, it's very likely not an issue of the driver hearing the alert, it's a matter of reacting. Look at the way freeway traffic unzips with military precision in Germany- they hear and respond and the EMS vehicles zoom down the middle.

28

adolforosado:
2. This is an attempt to save lives which are lost in intersections between emergency vehicles and people with their windows closed and the radio on.

Have you fully determined the causality of these accidents or you going on anecdotal evidence?

29

Look at the way freeway traffic unzips with military precision in Germany- they hear and respond and the EMS vehicles zoom down the middle.

I quite agree but Germany is the only country where this happens. I think this is for two reasons. First of all it is a German charastics to follow rules and second I have never seen a false warning on a German road.
Contrast that with the U.K. Where the warning lights on a motorway is almost a guarantee that there is nothing wrong. I have seen congestion warnings in the small hours of the morning when I am the only driver on the motorway.

30

Grumpy_Mike:
I quite agree but Germany is the only country where this happens.

Very likely, but the point is that it proves not letting EMS vehicles through is not because the driver can't hear the sirens. The Germans hear and react; others likely hear and ignore.

31

I'd like to hear how it could be done.

Not why it can't or won't

Please if you're just going to troll the post with negativity just abstain.

Does anybody know if this is in the realm of possibility for these little microprocessors, a couple of sound sensors and code.

Thanks!

By the way. Flying is a pain because the patriot act. The patriot act is not there to protect anyone. It's there to control everyone and make money for the war machine.

This is for when you're 90 degrees from the emergency vehicle, just around the corner but it's raining, you have the radio on or kids in the car and the windows are closed. You get a beep and a flash and you realize they're around the corner. Not so you know where everyone is or nothing. Just a microphone outside the vehicle that can hear what you can't in the high pitch ranges where they operate.

Accidents involving emergency vehicles such as fire trucks, ambulances, and police cars are a substantial problem in the United States. Vehicle fatality rates for emergency responders are estimated to be up to 4.8 times higher than the national average. Most emergency vehicle accidents occur at intersections or near driveways. They are also more likely to occur in poorly lit areas. Because emergency vehicles are typically traveling at higher speeds in urgent situations, the accidents often result in severe injury or death to occupants of the emergency vehicle or the passenger vehicle involved.

Below are some statistics regarding emergency vehicle accidents illustrating how large the problem is in the U.S.

Ambulance Accidents in the U.S.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) released a report in April of 2014 that provides an overview of the number of ambulance accidents in the United States. The agency studied the number of ambulance accidents over a 20 year period from 1992-2011.

Below are some of the key findings from the report:

Over the 20 year period, there were an estimated 4,500 accidents involving ambulances each year.
35% of accidents resulted in injury or fatality to at least 1 occupant of a vehicle involved.
An average of 29 fatal ambulance accidents produced 33 fatalities each year.
On average, 2,600 people are injured in 1,500 ambulance accidents each year.
Of those killed in an ambulance accident, 63% were occupants of a passenger vehicle, 21% were passengers in the ambulance, 4% were the ambulance driver, and 12% were non-occupants.
Nearly 60% of ambulance accidents occur during the course of emergency use.
Firetruck Accidents in the U.S.

According to data from the NHTSA and the United States Fire Administration (USFA), firetruck accidents are the second leading cause of on-the-job deaths for firefighters.

Below are some key findings from an analysis of NHTSA data on firetruck accidents from 2000-2009:

Over that 10 year period, there were roughly 31,600 accidents involving fire vehicles.
49 of those accidents resulted in at least one fatality to an occupant of the firetruck.
About 70% of all firetruck accidents occurred while in emergency use.
Rollovers account for 66% of all fatal firetruck accidents.
As seen in the statistics, firetruck accidents can be very serious, often resulting in serious injuries or even fatalities. Since firetrucks, like emergency ambulances, are frequently responding to emergency situations, most of the accidents occurred in such settings.

Police Car Accidents in the U.S.

Using data from 1994-2002, researchers from the University of Washington performed an analysis of the number of fatalities each year that occur during police pursuits.

Below are some of their key findings:

Each year there are approximately 300 fatalities in the U.S. that occur during police pursuits.
Just over 30% of the fatalities occurred to people who were not involved in the pursuit.

So you see, it's a big problem and I want to make something simple that you can pick up on eBay or at the convenient gas store for few bucks, glue it on your windshield inside and out and you're good to go. No need to pressure any government agencies or anything. Pure, sheer free enterprise for the common good.

32

Sounds like a lawsuit against the manufacturer waiting to happen.
You put said portable device on your car, device goes off, or not, you didn't notice it for whatever distracted reason, get hit by something, and then sue the manufacturer for the device not going off week well enough for you to notice it.

I don't have deep enough pockets to back that one.

33

I think someone has already posted the much better solution, some sort of device that allows the emergency responders to set the traffic lights all to red so everyone stops when they are coming.

My commute to work in the morning is 65 miles. I encounter 1 traffic light, less than 1/4 mile from the end. Automatically setting that light to red would not have much impact.

Diddling with lights has proven to cause more problems than it solves, so most emergency equipment has stopped doing that.

34

Around here, the lights are mostly on cycles (few smart intersections here & there) and when the emergency vehicles come thru they get a green light, and you sit at your red light longer.

35

Tape a microphone to the outside of your car. Park up near a hospital and record. Use some sort of sound visualiser app to look for a pattern or something you can use as a trigger. Then you can choose a device to detect whatever the trigger is.

36

For reasons mentioned above by several posters I consider this an impractical idea.

An anecdote.

I wonder how often this happens?

Some years ago I was driving in Cambridge, and noticed the sirens and blue flashing lights of a fire engine. Naturally I pulled over, and it tore past at enormous speed. I thought no more of it.

Some days later I met an old friend who's a fireman in the pub. "Did you see me the other day in Cambridge?" he asked.

"Don't think so" I replied.

"yes you did - and I saw you . I was driving that fire engine that overtook you on Newmarket Road"..

"what was the emergency - cat up a tree? "

"Nope - I just recognised your car and thought I'd buzz you"

B******d!

mind you, he did buy me a pint.

Allan

39

I am not interested in why you don't think this shouldn't be done.

If I needed your opinion whether this should be built or not. I'd ask you that.

Thanks for the signature pattern reply. You're one of the few who got it.

This is a technical forum for a microprocessor board. I need ideas on the build.

If all you have is a NO. Don't post it.

Thanks!!

41

adolforosado:
I'd like to hear how it could be done.

Not why it can't or won't

Please if you're just going to troll the post with negativity just abstain.

Does anybody know if this is in the realm of possibility for these little microprocessors, a couple of sound sensors and code.

OK, it can't be done.
This is because you will not get a signal clean enough signal from a microphone with all the ambient noise. Also the process does not have much memory and little in the way of processing power, it only has about the equivalent of a 1985 home computer.

OK so you don't want to believe me and want to try yourself.
So sample the sound from the microphone into a buffer. Then run two versions of the Goertzel algorithm through the data in this buffer, one for each frequency you want to detect.

42

no offense but ive listened to loud bass in my car and could still hear sirens, if you have it any louder than that you are a moron and deserve the hearing loss you will get, i know it doesnt solve your problem but car audio has been dieing since the 2000s less and less people have huge bass and prefer good bass with sound quality.

As others have said if they miss the lights, the truck siren ect... ud have to have something that either applys their brakes or shuts off the car or something to actually stop them. Heck why not have ambulances shielded and equipped with an emp :wink:

sorry im not helpful :frowning: