Patent ID: 7426437

Claim:
An accident avoidance system for a host vehicle, comprising: a global positioning system residing on the host vehicle for determining the host vehicle's location as the host vehicle travels based on signals received from one or more satellites; a map database comprising digital maps corresponding to an area comprising the location of the host vehicle as determined by the global positioning system; a vehicle-to-vehicle communication system residing on the host vehicle operative for receiving signals comprising location information acquired by global positioning systems residing on other vehicles directly from the other vehicles indicating the locations of the other vehicles; a navigation system comprising a display residing on the host vehicle for displaying images to an occupant of the host vehicle showing the digital maps and indications of the locations of the host vehicle and the other vehicles on the digital maps, and for updating the images shown on the navigation system display to reflect changes in the locations of the host vehicle and the other vehicles; a processor coupled to the global positioning system residing on the host vehicle, the map database and the vehicle-to-vehicle communication system and being operative to determine that a potential collision is likely to occur between the host vehicle and one of the other vehicles based on the location of the host vehicle provided by the global positioning system, the digital maps of the map database and the locations of the other vehicles provided by the vehicle-to-vehicle communication system; and a warning system operative for alerting an operator of the host vehicle of the potential collision.