2010 ALERT International Conference

LAS VEGAS, NV, - SKIDCAR SYSTEM, Inc. was pleased to have the opportunity to attend the 2010 ALERT (Association of Professional Law Enforcement Emergency Response Trainers) International Conference. For many months, we at SKIDCAR SYSTEM, Inc. have been working diligently to complete the curriculum details of our new ESC focused training program. It was presented in an abbreviated format for the first time during this conference, and judging from all feedback and accounts of the experience, the workshop was a great success.

We want to thank Director RuthAnn Baugh and Randy Jacoby of the Precision Driving Training Center OSU-OKC for their hospitality and use of their facility and Ford Expedition fitted with a SKIDCAR SYSTEM™. An outstanding number of attendees were able to get behind the wheel for the hands-on component of exposing ESC during our presentations, thanks to the PDTC accommodations.

In the last three years, SKIDCAR SYSTEM, Inc. has gained extensive knowledge through the use of our own SKIDCAR™ demonstration unit and by driving other vehicles both with and without ESC in the USA and Europe. This combination of experiences has provided us a very clear picture of the curriculum needed for future training with ESC.

Those that drove the PDTC Expedition with SKIDCAR found that ESC activates when the driver does something incorrect behind the wheel. Previously accepted control techniques only slowed down the recovery times and increased the amount of road surface used. All the while, ESC was doing its best to correct the driver’s problems. We feel that as we teach students how to drive with ESC rather than against it, control techniques will be more straightforward and take less time to master, ultimately providing more time for important components like a proactive thought process. Not surprisingly, everyone who participated in this exercise felt the same way. There is no question about the need for calculated exposure to these programs, and that assessment was only further reinforced by the outcome of our experience at ALERT.

The nature of the EVOC industry has always been one resistant to change. A perfect example is past skid control and cornering curriculum. The old training focuses singularly on a rear wheel or over steer skid and racing path of travel strategies that just don’t make sense in today’s driving environment. Doing nothing to change curriculum has proven to be the easiest course of action for a very long time. After training in the EVOC environment for more than 20 years, the minimal changes we have seen in curricula have failed to evolve much with modern thought process, technology, and environment.

Instructors did evolve however, due to years of experience and the personal initiative to increase their own knowledge. But now we are seeing a “changing of the guard” as many of these instructors are retiring. Without years of trial and error to lean on, young new instructors are turning to the published curriculum for guidance - the same curriculum that hasn’t changed in nearly two decades. It seems only practical that to increase safety and efficiency, we need to move forward with new ideas that work, utilizing the new technology available. Then, the new generation of instructors will be better equipped to train a new generation driver accustomed to learning in a different way.

Through the development of ESC, the automobile manufacturers and their safety system engineers have taken positive steps to forever change the way we will think about controlling a Car, Truck, or SUV in adverse conditions or an emergency event. Now, it will be up to the Law Enforcement Driver Training industry to meet the challenges of the very near future.

The Safety Issues of Computerized Car Control

Here are a couple of fascinating articles brought to our attention by Mark Edmund, a SKIDCAR driving instructor at the Iowa Law Enforcement Academy. Though not training based, they center on vehicle control by focusing on the idea that the computerized nature of vehicles today could potentially leave them vulnerable to attack from outside sources. This is an interesting safety concept, to say the least.

If you have articles or comments to share, please let us know. We would love to hear from you!

Taking Over a Car
Sept\Oct 2010
Cars are becoming more computerized, an evolution that could have an unintended side effect: vulnerability to attacks.
Source: Technology Review
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/26045/?a=f http://www.autosec.org/pubs/cars-oakland2010.pdf

There's More Than One Type of Skid

Why, oh why do driving instructors from all disciplines think there is only one type of skid?

Driver training in the 21st Century is getting very interesting. After 35 years of practical driver training experience at a number of different levels I think things are going backward. No pun intended!

Why do agencies (you know who you are) buy a very expensive and most cleverly designed piece of equipment and use it to only skid sideways, or even worse, play games with the students by pushing buttons and unexpectedly relieving grip to make them go out of control? I subscribe to throwing tasks at the driver, but let’s make sure it’s meaningful. I have seen and heard way too many stories of the driver never being held accountable for the slide because of the “show”. We have found (and so do most SKIDCAR users) that the student is highly qualified to make his or her own mistakes without any help… Thank you very much.

Back to this over steer, over react, over use, rear wheel slide-skid. Personally, I think it is focused on because it creates the most bang for the buck (in entertainment value). It’s fun to slide, easy to teach correction if you have enough room, and did I say it’s fun? In fact, there is a whole motorsport dedicated to just this: sliding sideways!

But mainly neglected is the fact that front-wheel skids are often the cause of a rear-wheel reaction. They are more difficult to recover from, and ultimately deadlier. Plus, the technology of ESC is about to change the game by removing the likelihood of rear-wheel skids, and leaving you with only the one that no one wants to talk about. Are you ready for that? Are your students? Don’t your public service officials deserve better?

I’d like to hear what you think.

Dane