Patent ID: 8762043

Claim:
A collision course prediction system comprising: a sensor system installable in a host vehicle and transmitting at an operating frequency, the sensor system detecting a target object external to the host vehicle and determining at least an object position (x, y) and an object velocity ({dot over (x)},{dot over (y)})of the target object relative to the host vehicle; a time-to-collision estimator control block calculating an estimated time-to-collision T.sub.ttc based on a longitudinal distance (x), a longitudinal velocity ({dot over (x)}) and a longitudinal acceleration ({umlaut over (x)}) of the target object relative to the host vehicle; a lateral distance estimator control block estimating a lateral distance (y) between respective centers of the host vehicle and the target object at the estimated time-to-collision T.sub.ttc, the estimation based upon a distance r to the target object from the host vehicle and a target angle (alpha) between the heading direction of the host vehicle and the position of the target vehicle determined by the sensor system; and a collision course condition determination unit determining, at a determination instant t prior to the estimated time-to-collision T.sub.ttc, a probability that the host vehicle will collide with the target object dependent at least in part upon whether the lateral distance is within a first interval, the first interval based on at least a lateral width of the host vehicle, a lateral width of the target object, and a target angle measurement error correction term Z 2 , the target angle measurement error correction term Z 2 dependent on the distance r at the determination instant t and including a factor k* dependent upon a noise distribution of the sensor system in sensing the target angle (alpha) when transmitting at the operating frequency, wherein the correction term Z 2 is determined as Z 2 =Z 0 +k*r, where Z 0 is a constant.