QR codes may help save lives with new use in Mercedes-Benz cars

When you think of a QR code, you probably think of the ones in the corners of street advertisements, encouraging you to scan for more information or to download a company’s app. However car maker Daimler is rolling out a new program that isn’t strictly about making money; it’s about saving lives.

In a recent press release, the company announced that Mercedes-Benz vehicles will be outfitted with QR code stickers, which rescuers can use to get important information about a vehicle in accidents. By scanning one of the two QR codes placed inside the vehicle – one on the fuel tank flap, and one on the B-pillar on the vehicle’s opposite side – rescuers can the information they need about where it is safe to cut open a vehicle.

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Usually, rescuers need to search for rescue sheets for a vehicle by calling in the registration plate or matching the vehicle in an app that provides car schematics. These sheets provide a sort of rescue map (which Mercedes-Benz makes available for all its vehicles via PDF here) for cars, outlining areas to avoid when dismantling a vehicle during a rescue, like fuel tanks and lines, high voltage areas on electric cars, air bags and seat belt tensioners, as well as the critical information of cutting points on a vehicle.

This takes a campaign by the German automobile club, Adac, to the next level, BBC reports. Adac has been encouraging drivers to keep a copy of their car’s ‘rescue map’ in the visor of their vehicles, but by car manufacturers taking this a step further and guaranteeing these rescue maps will be inside the vehicles, there’s a better chance that rescuers will know where to look, and be able to find the information they need quickly.

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Putting the QR stickers in cars may end up being an intermediate step as the European Commission plans to develop eCall, a service that automatically calls an emergency number in the event of an accident, by 2015. North American drivers may already be familiar with a similar feature through OnStar, a service installed in some vehicles made by General Motors.

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