Autonomous vehicle
An autonomous vehicle is provided herein. During operation, a person (e.g., a public-safety officer) will be assigned a task or mission that is identified by an identifier (e.g., an incident identifier, public-safety incident identifier, or an incident type). The incident identifier will be provided to the autonomous vehicle, and the autonomous vehicle will choose to “follow” the officer or not based on the incident identifier. Because the autonomous vehicle described above will only “follow” the officer for certain incident types, the officer will be able to perform many of their tasks without the annoyance of an automobile following them.
1. A method for operating an autonomous vehicle, the method comprising the steps of:
receiving a public-safety incident/assignment identification identifying a type of public-safety incident or assignment;
determining a current location;
determining a public-safety officer's location; and
determining to autonomously navigate a vehicle along a route to the public-safety officer's based on the public-safety incident/assignment identification.
2. The method of claim 1 further comprising the step of:
determining the route to the public-safety officer's location.
3. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of receiving the public-safety incident/assignment identification comprises the step of receiving the public-safety incident/assignment identification at a receiver via an over-the-air communication.
4. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of determining to autonomously navigate the vehicle the vehicle based on the public-safety incident/assignment identification comprises the step of accessing a memory to determine whether or not to autonomously navigate the vehicle.
5. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of determining the public-safety officer's location comprises the step of receiving the public-safety officer's location at a receiver via an over-the-air communication.
6. A method for operating an autonomous vehicle, the method comprising the steps of:
receiving a public-safety incident or assignment type identifying a type of public-safety incident or assignment;
determining to autonomously navigate a vehicle to a public-safety officer's location based on the public-safety incident or assignment type;
determining a current location;
determining the public-safety officer's location;
determining a route from the current location to the public-safety officer's location; and
navigating along the route from the current location to the devices location near the public-safety officer's location.
7. The method of claim 6 wherein the step of receiving the public-safety incident or assignment type comprises the step of receiving the public-safety incident or assignment type at a receiver via an over-the-air communication.
8. The method of claim 6 wherein the step of determining to autonomously navigate the vehicle to the public-safety officer's location based on the incident/assignment type comprises the step of accessing a memory to determine to autonomously navigate the vehicle.
9. The method of claim 6 wherein the step of determining the public-safety officer's location comprises the step of receiving the public-safety officer's location at a receiver via an over-the-air communication.
10. A vehicle comprising:
an over-the-air receiver receiving a public-safety incident or assignment type and a public-safety officer's location;
location circuitry determining a current location;
logic circuitry determining to autonomously navigate a vehicle to the public-safety officer's location based on the incident/assignment type, determining a route from the current location to the public-safety officer's location; and
a drive system navigating along the route from the current location to the devices location near the public-safety officer's location.
11. The apparatus of claim 10 further comprising:
a memory storing public-safety incident or assignment types and information regarding whether or not to autonomously navigate the vehicle for each public-safety incident or assignment type.