For the first time, a blind person has driven a street vehicle in public without the assistance of a sighted person — and successfully navigated 1.5 miles of the road course section of the Daytona International Speedway on January 29, dodging obstacles, some of them stationary and some thrown into his path at random from a van driving in front of him, according to the National Federation of the Blind (NFB).

Later he successfully passed the van without collision.  The Ford Escape was equipped by the Robotics and Mechanisms Laboratory at Virginia Tech with laser range-finding sensors that conveyed information to a computer inside the vehicle, allowing it to create and constantly update a three-dimensional map of the road environment.  The computer sent directions to vibrating gloves on the driver’s hands, indicating which way to steer, and to a vibrating strip on which he was seated, indicating when to speed up, slow down, or stop.

The event was in support of the NFB Blind Driver Challenge, a research project of the National Federation of the Blind Jernigan Institute intended to stimulate the development of non-visual interface technology.