NEWS

Future mobility tech company ACEWORKS announced on the 11th that it has recently converted 119 ambulances into self-driving ambulance vehicles that can monitor the site 24 hours a day in an emergency situation and transport patients quickly to related agencies. This is part of the government's "development of autonomous driving-based emergency vehicle traffic support service technology," and is the result ofACEWORKS winning the task and completing it in about a year.

This self-driving 119 ambulance based on Hyundai Motor's Staria is expected to contribute to overcoming the prevalence of underprivileged areas that are difficult to dispatch within "Golden Time" and the lack of ambulances and paramedics compared to the legal capacity.

The self-driving 119 ambulance is equipped with a hospital-linked system that can automatically collect and accommodate patient information, which is expected to improve the so-called "ambu-car hit-and-run" phenomenon, in which ambulance transport patients sadly die because they cannot visit the hospital.

The biggest feature of self-driving ambulances is that self-driving artificial intelligence (AI) searches for spaces where ambulances can enter without distinction of up and down through precise search of surrounding spaces based on various sensors installed in the vehicle. Normally, the driving speed of a self-driving 119 vehicle is 50km/h, and in principle, driving 60km/h is required for emergency transfer. However, if the situation is deemed urgent or an unexpected situation or abnormality occurs, the autonomous driving system can be remotely controlled to transfer the patient quickly and safely.

The ambulance's sensors were mainly equipped with Robosense LiDAR and cameras, and were equipped with A1 Driver, an Aceworks self-driving computer.

An official from the autonomous driving industry said, "If self-driving 119 ambulances are activated, positive changes are expected not only in technological development but also in terms of expanding the infrastructure of the emergency medical system in Korea."

Source: Oh Chul, reporter for the electric newspaper
URL: https://www.electimes.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=350221