There seems to be a misconception in regards to one of today’s modern safety enhancements added to new trucks and in some cases cars as well. This feature I’m referring to is the collision mitigation system. This feature is offered by various vendors in the automotive and truck manufacturing community.
In this blog, you will notice that I have not added any pictures as I want us to fully focus on the real meaning of mitigation. The word that I hear often used in place of mitigation is “avoidance.” Let’s look at the true definition of the word “avoidance” as written in the Merriam Webster’s Dictionary.
The simple definition of avoidance: the act of avoiding something. This leads us to dig deeper and understand the word avoid.
The simple definition of avoid
: To stay away from (someone or something)
: To prevent the occurrence of (something bad, unpleasant, etc.)
: To keep yourself from doing (something) or participating in (something)
Let’s also take a look at the true definition of the word mitigation which is an adjective of the verb mitigate. The simple definition of mitigate
: To cause to become less harsh or hostile
: To make less severe or painful
You can see that these two words clearly have different meanings and therefore they should not be used in place of one another in any sentence or statement. There are occasions where a collision mitigation system will indeed avoid a crash. This is a positive end result however avoiding accidents all together remains still the driver’s responsibility. The collision mitigation systems were designed to be a background support which would lessen the severity of a crash when the primary safety system (the driver) fails.
Many features on today’s modern vehicles can fall into this same category as a background support system for the driver. Just because you have antilock brakes doesn’t mean you should drive around slamming on your brakes thinking you can drive without incident. Roll stability and other advanced vehicle handling systems were not developed so that drivers can just enter a turn at excessive speeds without any impunity. The point I’m trying to make here is that these technologies can be fantastic when making up for driver error. It’s important to understand that drivers still hold the keys when it comes to highways safety.