Alcohol sensors

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32678, 6 August 1971, Page 7

Alcohol sensors

A sensor which can “smell” alcohol on the breath of a driver and immobilise his car is one of several ideas being studied in the United States to overcome the problem of the. drinking driver, Julian Mounter reports in “The Times.”

The gadget, tried by the Ford company, has not been very successful, he reports. There are problems if the driver is sober but the passenger is drunk, and the sensor also has difficulty differentiating among the fumes of alcohol, aftershave lotion, and perfume. General Motors has been working on a device which gives the driver a reaction test. A number is flashed on a small screen on the car's dash, and the driver has to punch out the same number on a series of keys within a certain time in order to unlock the ignition system. But opponents of the scheme, apart from raising the question of cost, ask

what happens when a man has to rush someone to hospital in the middle of the night, and becomes confused or panicky. In answer, it has been suggested the machine could be installed only in the cars of those with records for drinking and driving. In an emergency, it is suggested, the machine -could be cut out of the system by a switch which would also start a light flashing on top of the car. Then police could stop the car, and the driver would have to give a good reason for using the cutout. The research has been spurred by American roadsafety experts’ reports that drink is involved in more than half of the fatal road accidents in the United States. Bigger plant Chrysler United Kingdom, Ltd, has opened a slm extension to its car assembly plant in Dublin, Ireland. The factory will export to Britain and Europe.