By Jo Best, 14 September 2005 16:25
NEWS The European Union's plan to install technology that can remotely contact the emergency services in all new cars is being stymied by the lassitude of member states.
eCall, the system that will enable all cars to contact 112 (the international equivalent of 999), is due to be fitted to all new cars from 2009. However, the EC said a major effort is needed from member states to meet the deadline.
Information society and media commissioner Viviane Reding said she was pleased with the industry's efforts in installing the tech - which will contact the emergency services in the event of a crash and inform them of the car's location - but urged Europe's governments to invest and promote the technology more.
According to the European Commission, the necessary infrastructure upgrades needed to receive the emergency calls are "way behind schedule".
Using eCall will result in a reduction of between five and 10 per cent in road accident fatalities, said the EC, as the emergency services will have more accurate information with which to locate the injured, allowing them to attend to accidents faster.
Field tests of the eCall system are scheduled to begin next year.
Comments
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1. anonymous
Good idea but what else will the device do?
It will in effect be a mobile phone, which in turn transmits a signal which means every vehicle can be tracked through out the EU. The result, the technology has been introduced to for World Wide charging for using your car.
2. Andrew Lewis
Could be a good idea but it is too open to abuse from Big Brother watching you under the pretence of national security.
The technology is already in place for exact location to be triangulated from someone calling in an emergency or a breakdown from their cellphone. Why should there be a need for yet another device?
Another thought for consideration is that more and more people have sat nav whther built in or portable. You can give an exact GPS location from most of them. By 2009 what percentage of drivers will have sat nav? I should imagine very high.
I think this project will be outdated, expensive and potentially intrusive by the time it is introduced as standard.
I suppose it does keep some euocrats in a job!