Each year in the United States hundreds of traffic collisions occur at controlled intersections involving emergency vehicles and the public.

• These accidents often cause loss of property and sometimes loss of life. (For instance: 20-25% of fire fighter deaths occur while responding to alarms!)
• They also put the public at further risk because of extended emergency support response times.

A system that could help preclude these incidents would save local governments money, reduce response times, and ultimately save lives:

SirenSensor™ is a unique electronic system that detects the siren sound of an approaching emergency vehicle, enabling the intersection traffic controller to give that vehicle right of way through the intersection. The most notable aspect of the SirenSensor™ system is that it can be incorporated into a municipality’s traffic control facilities without the need of installing additional equipment on emergency vehicles.

SirenSensor™ system consists of a set of special acoustic horns and an electronic interface module. One horn is used to detect each direction of travel at an intersection. The horns may be arranged in any number to satisfy all intersection configurations. As an example, a typical north, south, east, west four-way intersection would employ four horns.

The horns are mounted to the intersection light standards aimed to monitor the four directions of travel through the intersection. The north facing horn would detect a south-bound emergency vehicle’s siren. The south facing horn would detect a north-bound vehicle and so forth. The control electronics interface module provides all appropriate timing and communication between the four horns and the intersection traffic control electronics. The horns are constantly monitoring their respective direction. Upon detection of a siren, that dominant horn sends a call to the interface module which mutes all other horns. The interface then provides one of four pre-emption calls to the controller. Each pre-emption call activates a preprogrammed routine in the controller to sequence through appropriate light conditions to give the emergency vehicle a safe right of way.