A sheriff in Virginia would like to implement a high-tech solution to deadly crashes involving horse-drawn buggies.

WTVR News reported Cumberland County Sheriff Darrell Hodges approached state legislators about implementing a system in which Amish buggies would trigger flashing lights to alert vehicle drivers that a horse and buggy is within a two-mile radius. The Virginia Department of Transportation is conducting a study.

Virginia already requires horse-drawn buggies to have white front lights and red rear lights visible up to 500 feet. Hodges’ proposal is similar to auto pass windshield stickers that detect vehicles on toll roads.

“To be perfectly honest, I’ve picked up the last child on the side of the road that I ever want to that’s been killed in an accident, especially in a horse and buggy,” Hodges told WTVR. The Amish “need a voice, and as law enforcement I feel that we should be their voice to help protect and keep them safe.”

It is unclear whether the system would be embraced by Amish groups.They vary in willingness to use lights and reflectors on buggies, but there is precedent with some groups to use alternators to charge batteries for lights.

Steven Nolt, director of the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania, said he was not aware of a system like this in use in the United States or Canada.

“Would the Amish go for it? I think it would range from ‘quite a stretch’ to ‘no’ for the vast majority of Amish,” Nolt told AW. “But given the fact that the group there in Cumberland County (Farmville settlement) is from here in Lancaster County, Pa., there’s a chance they might go for it. The Amish here in Lancaster have a long tradition of working with local and state safety officials.”