2023-05-22 17:22:20
In one of the Waygroup simulators, experiences with common causes of car accidents are recreated. PHOTO Carlos Velasquez
Imagine the following scene: you are driving a truck loaded with 40 tons, you cross the Line Tunnel in third gear, 35 kilometers away, and the engine disc heats up. It crashes, there are several deaths. Catastrophic moments like this can now be prevented with the support of various types of technologies.
That is the promise of Waygroup, a Paisa company that builds haptic simulators and also use immersive virtual reality to offer moments close to what could happen in real life: You feel like you are in the truck, which is on the top floor of a building about to fall.
Mistakes are made in these immersive experiences and not in reality. Have 12 simulator references for different types of situations (including driving): risk at heights, confined spaces for mining, reactions in times of emergencies such as cardiopulmonary resuscitation and handling of fire extinguishers,
All simulators are made up of several parts such as VR headsets to achieve 360 vision and hear 3D sound and for the haptic component (touch) they use motors and motion and temperature sensors.
There is also a software (program) developed by the same company where the scene is recreated, it is something very similar to a video game: they created it in the Unreal Engine 5 video game engine.
“Our concept is to save livesSo, from neuroscience and psychology, there is a concept that is learned from one’s own mistakes and experiences, when one is touched by emotion, one is able to understand what happens in life when overconfidence leads us to make mistakes”, said Diego Ramírez, CEO of Waygroup.
Behind the human team that creates these devices There are graduates from the SENA, the UPB and Eafit. They are professionals in areas such as mechatronic engineering, welders, 3D modelers, and software developers, among others.
On the haptic component side, they work with robotics equipment that allows movements that result in the vibration and inclination of the vehicle. In other cases they use temperature sensors to feel, for example, the heat in a fire scene. In those of height it is possible to feel the wind with the support of fans.
They also use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to interpret the decisions of the person who is living the experience or the characters that are part of the scenes. In the practice: he is driving the car simulator, a cell phone that he has in the passenger seat rings and when he moves to pick up the phone, the AI detects this action, that he is not looking straight ahead, then a crash occurs.
Franco Oberti is Waygroup’s Head of Development and explained that creating one of these simulators takes an average of 12 monthsbut it all depends on the complexity you require.
“In a video game people don’t mind crashing, they speed up and laugh, but when we use virtual reality in this case people look up, down, stick their heads out the window, we put people in the world of the truck and that is what allows the moment to be recorded in memory and prevents an accident. With VR and haptic integrations we hit the emotion very hard,” she explained.
Each training is accompanied by an expert advisor on the subject that as progress is made, it explains what should be done in a certain situation and provides feedback to achieve greater awareness.
In the last three years, more than 700,000 people from 540 companies in Colombia, Spain and Chile have used these simulators Made in Medellin. Soon they will arrive in Mexico and other countries.
“Companies find in these immersive experiences a very important contribution to support the issue of raising awareness among their workers. We come with the creation of more simulators for the subject of heavy machinery, in agriculture for the handling of tractorswe are going to have one for the use of chainsaws and another for the operation of airports on the ground,” added Ramírez.
In September, the Coca Cola beverage company will show these simulators at a world fair in Atlanta, United States, as one of the best road safety practices in Latin America.
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