Method to track and to alert autonomous driving vehicles (ADVS) of emergency vehicles

A non-transitory machine-readable medium having instructions stored therein, which when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations, the operations comprising:

• sending a current location information of the ADV to an alert service over a network, wherein the alert service is in communication with one or more ADVs;
• receiving a broadcast alert signal from the alert service, wherein the alert service has determined that the ADV is or will be located in an alert area, wherein the location of the alert area is determined based on a location of an emergency vehicle having a higher priority of travel;
• in response to receiving the broadcast alert signal, examining a current state and the current location of the ADV in view of the alert area to determine whether the ADV should overtake or yield the alert area based on a set of rules;
• generating a trajectory to control the ADV to navigate the alert area based on the examination, controlling the ADV to be in a yield state comprising yielding, by the ADV, to incoming traffic including the emergency vehicle;
• and
• if the ADV is in an intersection, controlling the ADV to move away from the intersection prior to yielding to the incoming traffic.

A data processing system, comprising:

• one or more processors;
• and
• a memory coupled to the one or more processors to store instructions, which when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations, the operations including
• sending a current location information of the ADV to an alert service over a network, wherein the alert service is in communication with one or more ADVs;
• receiving a broadcast alert signal from the alert service, wherein the alert service has determined that the ADV is or will be located in an alert area, wherein the location of the alert area is determined based on a location of an emergency vehicle having a higher priority of travel;
• in response to receiving the broadcast alert signal, examining a current state and the current location of the ADV in view of the alert area to determine whether the ADV should overtake or yield the alert area based on a set of rules;
• generating a trajectory to control the ADV to navigate the alert area based on the examination,
• controlling the ADV to be in a yield state comprising yielding, by the ADV, to incoming traffic including the emergency vehicle;
• and
• if the ADV is in an intersection, controlling the ADV to move away from the intersection prior to yielding to the incoming traffic.

A computer-implemented method for operating an alert service to broadcast alert signals to autonomous driving vehicles, the method comprising:

• receiving current location information from one or more emergency vehicles, the emergency vehicles having a higher priority of travel on roads;
• determining one or more alert areas based on the location information for the one or more emergency vehicles;
• receiving current location information from one or more ADVs;
• determining if any of the ADVs will enter or is currently within a predetermined proximity of the one or more alert areas based on the current location information of the ADVs;
• and
• broadcasting an alert signal to an ADV, in response to determining that the ADV will enter or is currently within the predetermined proximity of the one or more alert areas, wherein in response to receiving the broadcast alert signal, if the ADV is in an intersection, the ADV is to move away from the intersection prior to yielding to incoming traffic.