The George Municipality in the Western Cape has unveiled a groundbreaking device to assist in water emergencies, ahead of the busy summer beach season. Using drone technology, fire and rescue officials can drop inflatable devices to swimmers in distress.
The aim is to keep visitors safe at their beaches.
Innovative drone technology is being used to rescue swimmers and is a first for South Africa. Attached to the drone is a floating device, which inflates automatically on deployment, keeping the swimmer afloat, until they’re rescued.
The device also has an audio function, which allows rescuers to communicate with those in distress and the rescue team.
Neels Barnard, George Municipality’s Fire Chief, explains how it works.
“It’s for patients or persons that get in trouble in the water so that we can get to them much quicker with the drone, and while we wait for the jet rip to come in and come and pick them up. So they can hold on to this device and the jet rip can pick them up.”
With Wilderness being a hot-spot for frequent drowning incidents and fierce rip currents, this device is intended to boost rescues.
“So we have got some help with the technology and now we are able to drop life-saving devices to buy patents time until the life savers or people on jet skis or any other vessel can get to our patients. This is all about saving lives and providing a service to the community. And with lifeguards being part of the fire service it’s a rescue function of ours, so we are really trying to better our service to the public,” explains Santa Sternsdorf, the station commander at the George Fire Department.
As the December holidays approach, the municipality’s mobile Joint Operations Centre will set-up in Wilderness to keep a close eye on beachgoers.
Barnard says they’ll be able to act fast with any incidents.
“We are lucky enough we have the NSRI with us and we normally stand at Dolphins point and we pick everything up there on the camera and then we activate the drone with this device so we can save more people and get there faster to save people.”
The rescue services currently have two of these innovative inflatable devices and both are re-usable.
George Municipality unveils drone technology for lifesavers:
