Volvo Refining Pedestrian Detection Tech to Avoid Kangaroos

In rural Texas, it is very common to see deer and wild hogs smeared all over the side of the road where they have run out in front of cars. It’s not uncommon to see cars destroyed sitting on the side of the road after hitting a 300-pound wild boar either. In Australia, its kangaroos that drivers have to worry about.

Apparently, a kangaroo is a highly unpredictable animal that hops like a lunatic all over the place. Volvo thinks that it can refine its pedestrian detection technology to identify kangaroos and help drivers avoid them. Volvo has tweaked the same tech in the past for Swedish drivers to help them avoid moose, reindeer, and cows.

To test its equipment, Volvo kicked off a round of tests at the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve near Canberra, one of the hotspots for kangaroo collisions in Australia. This testing and tuning is part of Volvo’s vision that no one be seriously injured or killed by a new Volvo car by 2020.