Peer Reviewed Online International Journal Volume 1, Issue 2, June 2014 5

Wireless Black Box with MEMS

Accelerometer and GPS Tracking for

Accidental Detection of Vehicle and Theft Control

Nahar Dhruv

Dept of Electronics and Communication Engineering

AMC Engineering College

Bangalore, India

dhruvnahar@gmail.com

Chetan Adhikary

Dept of Electronics and Communication Engineering

AMC Engineering College

Bangalore, India

chetanadhikary@gmail.com

Abstract

Now-a-days lots of accidents happen on highways due to

increase in traffic and also due to rash driving of the driv-

ers. And in many situations the family members or the ambu-

lance and police authorities are not informed on time. This

results in delaying the help reaching to the person suffered

due to accident. Vehicle Detection GSM modem is designed

to avoid such situations.

In this project an accident detection unit name MEMS

accelerometer is used which will be mounted under the rid-

er's seat of the car. This system, in case of accident, or if the

car hits to some other vehicle or an object then accelerome-

ter gives the values greater than threshold value and hence

microcontroller will handle grabbing the position and send-

ing the SMS to the predefined numbers. The system consists

of cooperative components GPS device and GSM module.

Focusing on this idea, a system where vehicle itself intimates

the concern emergency service for immediate reaction in

case of accident or any emergency situation is proposed.

After the accident, this wireless device will send mobile

phone short message indicating the position of vehicle by

GPS system to family members, police station and hospitals.

The emergency medical service (EMS) can be provided to

the driver. The threshold algorithm is used to determine

speed of motorcycle and fall or accident in real-time.

Keywords

Accelerometer, GSM module, GPS device, Microcontrol-

ler, ADC, LCD.

Introduction

ACCIDENTS ARE BOUND TO HAPPEN. The vehicle accident is a major public problem in many countries. De-

spite awareness campaign, this problem is still in-creasing

due to rider's poor behaviors such as speed driving, drunk

driving, riding with no helmet protection, riding without

sufficient sleep, etc. The numbers of death and disability are

very high because of late assistance to people meeting with

the accident. These cause huge social and economic burdens

to people involved. Therefore, several research group and

major vehicle manufacturers including Honda have devel-

oped safety devices to protect riders from accidental injuries.

However, good safety device for vehicle is difficult to im-

plement and very expensive. Alternatively, intelligence

schemes such as fall or incident detection with tracking sys-

tem have also recently been devised to notify the accident to

related people so that quickest assistance can reach people

meeting with the accident. Thus, accident alarm system for

vehicle has recently gained attention because these systems

are expected to save life by helping riders to get medical

treatment on time. In this work, a system device using

MEMS accelerometer and GPS tracking system is developed

for accidental monitoring. In the event of accident, this wire-

less device will send mobile phone short message indicating

the position of vehicle by GPS system to family member,

emergency medical service (EMS) and nearest hospital so

that they can provide ambulance assistance and preparation

of treatment for the patients. The system consists of coopera-

tive components of an accelerometer, microcontroller unit

(MCU), GPS device and GSM module for sending a short

message. An accelerometer is applied for awareness and fall

International Journal of Innovatory Research in Engineering and Technology IJIRET www.ijirusa.webs.com

Peer Reviewed Online International Journal Volume 1, Issue 2, June 2014 6

detection indicating an accident. The speed of vehicle and

threshold algorithm are used to decide a fall or accident in

real-time. Mobile short message containing position from

GPS (latitude, longitude) will be sent when vehicle accident

is detected. The robust package design is implemented so

that it is safe from water's spray and dust in environment.

The module is aimed to be installed at the position where the

system can be able to detect vibrations easily.

System Overview

The system consists of cooperative components of an

accelerometer, microcontroller unit, GPS device, Global

positioning system for Mobile module, sensors for sending a

short massage. An accelerometer is applied for awareness

and fall detection indicating an accident. If any accident is

occurred then the location of the vehicle is traced by the

longitude and latitude values of GPS and sends a SMS to the

nearest hospitals and family members so that they can be

ready for the treatment. A high performance 16 bits MCV is

used to process and store real-time signal from the accel-

erometer as well as sensors.

Figure 1. General Idea of the System

A} Existing System

In existing system most of the people associate black

boxes with airplanes but they are no longer just the key tool

in investigation of airplane accidents. Presently tracking

system is introduced in vehicles to avoid the accidents and

save peoples life. But these systems are still installed in

some of the high-end vehicles only because these systems

are too expensive for most of the vehicle riders. In our pro-

ject we are introducing fall detection and alarm system

which is expected to save peoples life by detecting the acci-

dents occurred and provides help by tracing the location of

the vehicle riders with the help of GPS technology. This

provides the information of the vehicle rider if any accident

is occurred to the family members and at the same time it

can send a message to the hospital, also police station for the

help.

B} Design Challenges

The challenge of the Project is to create a Black Box for

vehicle which will used to find the exact location of vehicle.

Consider the situation that a vehicle is met with an accident

in the middle of highway and there is no immediate assis-

tance from anybody nearby. If any injury is happened to the

vehicle driver or passengers, there may be loss of lives due

to delay in medical help. Keeping this idea in our mind, we

are proposing a system where vehicle itself intimates the

concern emergency service for immediate reaction in case

of accident or any emergency situation.

If the rider is safe and the system is misfired, later the

rider may have to face various legal consequences like po-

lice etc. So there is utter need of safety and also assurance

that the system works 100% correctly. Thus the control of

stopping the firing of alerting process is given to the rider

itself. Under the case of normal minor accident, the rider

itself can turn off the process of alarm, since the rider knows

that he/she is safe. Whence the other way round when the

rider has met with severe accident, the system waits 10 se-

conds seeking rider to turn it off if the rider is safe, it will

start the process of sending short message containing the

location of the vehicle otherwise.

C} Proposed Work

The proposed work will work out by creating a black

box.

Vehicle Location detection system: This is another

advantage of the system that we can track the vehicle loca-

tion just by sending the mobile SMS to the vehicle. Owner

vehicle is equipped with GPS device so it is possible to lo-

cate the vehicle location on Google map is very easy. Here

user will send Preformatted SMS to vehicle in response ve-

hicle system will use GPS device and collect the current

vehicle longitude and latitude and send back as a reply to

the SMS. Now user get the vehicle location as SMS now he

can use these details to track the vehicle on Google map

using Google earth like software.

Vehicle accident surveillance: In day to day life we are

facing many problems and many times we are helpless and

need someones assistance and which is not an accident analysis system based on an in-vehicle complaint EDR that

allows the acquisition of multimedia content, considering the

three main elements of traffic safety: vehicle, driver, and

International Journal of Innovatory Research in Engineering and Technology IJIRET www.ijirusa.webs.com

Peer Reviewed Online International Journal Volume 1, Issue 2, June 2014 7

road. Consider a situation we are going for long drive and

suddenly we are caught in critical condition it may be acci-

dent. If we are ok and can help ourselves then it is ok but

what if we cant. Consider another condition if we found that our vehicle has been stolen we cant do anything as quick action. We are having so many technologies to overcome

such problem and provide artificial intelligent based system

to assist human in such a condition. Consider a vehicle had

an accident the sensor will activated automatic and start its surveillance mode. If user is ok and can help himself then he

will stop surveillance mode within given time period else

system will consider user need assistance and start auto con-

tacting with call center and specified person. Once the sys-

tem started in assistance mode first of all system will gather

the vehicle location using GPS device in the form of longi-

tude and latitude. This information is sent to the subscribed

numbers. Once the call center get the vehicle status it will

search for nearest hospital, ambulance service and contact

then to reach at accident location to help out the person.

Figure 2. Real Time Working of the System

System Architecture

The process of working of this project is explained as

follows. The total equipment of this project is placed inside a

vehicle is not visible to others. Here we have MEMS accel-

erometer which will sense the movements of the vehicle

continuously. When an accident occurs to the vehicle the

movement of the vehicle while the incident is occurring will

be detected by the MEMS and this information is given to

microcontroller. Here we use GPS module to track the loca-

tion of the vehicle where the accident has occurred. GPS can

get the graphical location of the vehicle. The location values

are given to microcontroller. Controller gives this infor-

mation to GSM module. By using GSM we can send the

message to family members, emergency medical service and

nearest hospital.

It also serves as an excellent safety system against

thefts. If a thief tries to forcefully open the door, the system

sends message to the owner instantly as alerting signal, thus

necessary actions can be carried out quickly. Also if the ve-

hicle is already blown away by thief and you failed to stop

him, a message sent as Info will get you back an acknowledgement message from the number installed in the

system stating current GPS location. Thus the owner may

further approach police for further actions and thus vehicle

can be obtained back.

A} Flowchart

The Flow Chart of the system is shown in the figure 3.

It shows the system is initialized on power ON. When the

system is detected to be abnormal, its confirmed that the accident has occurred. The MEMS acceleration of the vehi-

cle is detected to confirm the cause of the accident. As soon

as the accident is detected the command is scanned first and

it waits 10 seconds prior to initiate the process of tracing

location and sending short message. If it is a minor accident

then the rider itself can terminate the process. If it is a major

accident, after 10 seconds the message is sent automatically

to the authorized person, ambulance, and police after the

location is detected by the GPS.

Figure 3. Data Flow Diagram

Conclusion

The proposed work has delivered very reliable results of

accident identification, location and physiological parame-

International Journal of Innovatory Research in Engineering and Technology IJIRET www.ijirusa.webs.com

Peer Reviewed Online International Journal Volume 1, Issue 2, June 2014 8

ters monitoring and transmission. The entire works have to

be integrated with the automobile to validate its functionality

and reliability. Thus this work will reduce the accident death

ratio in considerable amount even in rural roads. Then it has

a great importance in day to day life of the people in the

country like India. The complete integration with automo-

bile, the accident identification module will be fastened with

the standard Airbag ECU (Electronic Control Unit). This

will optimize the proposed technology to the maximum ex-

tent and deliver the best accident identification system. The

collision detection algorithm for the ECU of single point

sensing airbag system has enhanced accident detection sys-

tem to release the airbag provision in the present vehicles.

So, the present work will be fastened with this existing sys-

tem to provide the enhanced and instant result. Thus this

work will provide vital information about the accidents even

in unpopulated area. So, the emergence care center could be

able to serve to the victims with better efficiency and they

could plan to have important first aid kits which have to be

brought along with them to the accident spot. Also, theft

vehicle can be traced with accuracy with the same system

getting the GPS acknowledgement message instantly. Thus,

this proves a full-proof as well as cheap security system

which can be installed in any vehicle.

Acknowledgement

Nahar Dhruv and Chetan Adhikary are thankful to IJIR

Journal for the support to publish this research paper through

Mother Teresa Publishers.

References

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Biographies

NAHAR DHRUV received his B.E.

degree in Electronics and Communi-

cation Engineering from the Karavali

institute of Technology under VTU

University, Mangalore, Karnataka, in

2012, and currently doing his M.Tech

degree in Electronics and Communi-

cation Engineering from the AMC

engineering college under VTU Uni-

versity Bangalore, Karnataka.

He may be reached at dhruvnahar@gmail.com.

CHETAN ADHIKARY received

his B.E. degree in Electronics &

Communication Engineering from

the APS College of Engineering,

Bangalore, Karnataka in 2007, the

M.Tech degree in Electronics &

Communication Engineering from

the AMC college of Engineering,

Bangalore, Karnataka in 2011. Cur-

rently, he is an assistant Professor of

Electronics and Communication Engineering at AMC Engi-

neering College.

He may be reached at chetanadhikary@gmail.com.