Encounter vehicle determination apparatus

An encounter vehicle determination apparatus used in a vehicle,

• the encounter vehicle determination apparatus comprising:
• a different-vehicle information acquisition section that acquires different-vehicle information transmitted by wireless communication from a different vehicle around a host vehicle mounting the encounter vehicle determination apparatus to specify a position and a travel direction of the different vehicle;
• a different-vehicle state specification section that specifies the position and the travel direction of the different vehicle based on the different-vehicle information acquired by the different-vehicle information acquisition section;
• a host-vehicle course estimation section that estimates a host-vehicle course on a map;
• a host-vehicle intersection extraction section that extracts host-vehicle intersections that are intersections on the host-vehicle course estimated by the host-vehicle course estimation section;
• a connection road extraction section that extracts roads in a predetermined range, the roads connecting to the host-vehicle intersections extracted by the host-vehicle intersection extraction section;
• a different-vehicle map matching section that performs map matching to match the different vehicle to a matched location on a road of the map based on the position and the travel direction of the different vehicle specified by the different-vehicle state specification section;
• a different-vehicle intersection extraction section that extracts different-vehicle intersections that are intersections on a course where the different vehicle matched either to the host-vehicle course estimated by the host-vehicle course estimation section or to the road extracted by the connection road extraction section travels from the matched location of the different vehicle to the host-vehicle course;
• a host-vehicle intersection entering probability estimation section that estimates probabilities of the host vehicle entering the host-vehicle intersections extracted by the host-vehicle intersection extraction section;
• a different-vehicle intersection entering probability estimation section that estimates probabilities of the different vehicle entering the different-vehicle intersections extracted by the different-vehicle intersection extraction section;
• an encounter probability calculation section that calculates a probability of an encounter between the host vehicle and the different vehicle at each host-vehicle intersection from probabilities of the host vehicle entering the host-vehicle intersections estimated by the host-vehicle intersection entering probability estimation section and probabilities of the different vehicle entering the different-vehicle intersections estimated by the different-vehicle intersection entering probability estimation section;
• and
• an encounter determination section that determines, as the different vehicle that encounters the host vehicle, the different vehicle having the probability of the encounter calculated to be equal to or more than a threshold, by the encounter probability calculation section.