safetytoyota.com

System to mitigate damage in the event of an accident

About 70 percent of all accidents resulting in death or serious injury are caused by a delay in the driver’s recognition of the situation, including a failure by the driver to look ahead carefully or to confirm that conditions are safe. A delay in the driver’s recognition that a collision may occur causes a delay in the driver’s decision and actions for avoiding a collision, possibly increasing the chance of an accident occurring or the amount of damage in the event of accident.
Toyota's Pre-Crash Safety system recognizes the possibility of a collision of which the driver is unaware and alerts the driver, thereby prompting action for avoid the collision. Moreover, the system determines in advance whether a collision is unavoidable and mitigates damage to the driver and passengers.

Pre-Crash Safety system working in combination with a sensor with excellent object-recognition capability

Toyota's unique pre-crash sensor with excellent object-recognition capability achieved by employing a millimeter wave radar allows detection of a vehicle or an obstacle ahead, and the collision-determining computer determines the possibility of a collision based on the position, speed, path, and other characteristics of the object and unavoidableness of a collision as well in advance.

Alerting

Display and buzzer

If the system determines that a collision is likely to occur, it alerts the driver with a display and buzzer to prompt the driver to take actions to avoid that collision.

Mitigation of damage to driver and passengers

Pre-crash brake assist

The system applies additional brake pressure to generate an even greater braking force than normal in accordance with the force applied on the brake pedal by the driver.

Pre-crash seatbelt

If the system determines that a collision is unavoidable, it retracts the front seatbelts before the collision to enhance the effect of the pretensioner mechanism activated at the time of a collision. In addition, when the driver brakes hard suddenly, the system retracts the front seatbelts if it determines that the vehicle is likely to be rendered uncontrollable.

Pre-crash brake

If the system decides that a collision is unavoidable, it automatically applies the brake to reduce the vehicle's speed.

Expansion of the Pre-Crash Safety system

Toyota thinks that expanding the Pre-Crash Safety system, which mitigates damage caused in the event of an accident, could be an effective way to reduce the number of deaths and injuries resulting from traffic accidents.
Toyota equipped this system to "HARRIER" in February 2003 for the first time in the world. Since then, the system has been equipped with certain model vehicles. The Pre-Crash Safety system will continue evolving while being equipped with more models.