Tailgating is a dangerous driving behavior because it greatly increases the likelihood of rear-end collisions. If the vehicle in front brakes suddenly, the driver is less likely to avoid a collision. Tailgating collisions can cause expensive vehicle repairs, insurance claims, and even legal consequences if the tailgating driver is at fault.
In this articleThe vehicle is dangerously close to the vehicle in front while traveling at least 25 mph (40 km/h). If the vehicle in front brakes suddenly, the driver is unlikely to avoid a collision. This can happen if the vehicle in front enters the driver’s lane suddenly, or the driver gets too close due to unsafe driving.
To keep a safe following distance, many experts recommend drivers use the “2-second rule.”
To apply the 2-second rule while driving, do the following:
- Pick a fixed object on the side of the road, like a signpost or a tree.
- When the vehicle in front of you passes the object, start counting "one-thousand-one, one-thousand-two".
- If your vehicle passes the same landmark before you finish counting, you are following too closely and need to increase your following distance.
Reveal applies a Tailgating tag in one of the following ways:
- Camera AI: The driving behavior is detected by the AI Dashcam in real-time, alerts the driver (if in-cab alerts are enabled) and triggers a video event in Reveal.
- Cloud AI: The driving behavior is detected by the cloud AI when the video is uploaded to Reveal. The video event was triggered by a different unsafe driving behavior.
Note
Even if driving behaviors detected by camera AI are disabled in your fleet's AI driving assistance settings, videos triggered by other events will be analyzed and the driving behavior may be detected by the cloud AI.
The AI detection overlay shows the distance in seconds (headway) between your driver's vehicle and the vehicle in front.
When tailgating is detected, a red box appears around the vehicle that the driver is too close to. The headway, in seconds, is displayed on the video.
The overlay is on by default. To switch the overlay on or off, choose the AI detection overlay toggle in the video player.
Note
This functionality may be unavailable if the object detection analysis is incomplete or has failed.
Videos can be falsely triggered, usually when an AI Dashcam lens is obstructed or in the wrong position.