Patent ID: 9734695
Date: 2017-08-15
CPC Classifications: G08B

Claim:
1. A vehicle activity monitoring apparatus comprising: a vehicle body structure defining a vehicle interior; a vehicle front door fixed to the vehicle body structure for movement between an open orientation and a closed orientation; a front door movement detection device configured to sense movement of the front door from the closed orientation to the open orientation and from the open orientation to the closed orientation; a vehicle component attached to the vehicle body structure for movement between a first position exposing a rearward area of the vehicle interior and a second position at least partially concealing the rearward area of the vehicle interior; a movement detection device installed within the vehicle body structure and coupled to the vehicle component sensing movement of the vehicle component between the first position and the second position; a vehicle ignition device within the vehicle body structure operated by a vehicle operator to control operation of a vehicle engine; an alerting device configured to provide an alarm signal; and a controller operably connected to each of the front door movement detection device, the movement detection device, the vehicle ignition device and the alerting device, such that in response to the controller detecting a sequence of events based only on: movement of the front door via signals from the front door movement detection device; movement of the vehicle component via signals from the movement detection device; and detection of operation of the vehicle ignition device, the controller determines whether or not the vehicle operator has potentially left an object in the rearward area of the vehicle interior, where the determination does not require physical detection of the presence of the object and in response to determining that the vehicle operator has potentially left an object in the rearward area of the vehicle interior the controller operates the alerting device to provide the alarm signal to the vehicle operator.