St. Jean de Luz beach in southern France has audio buoys to help visually impaired (blind) swimmers to swim confidently without the fear of getting lost.The beach has installed buoys with audio sensors to give swimmers their location as audio messages. The audio buoys are placed at fifty metres intervals. The swimmer wears a electronic device as a bracelet. On pressing the buttons in the bracelet, the bracelet communicates with the audio buoys around, and the swimmer receives a audio message from the buoys indicating location with respect to the beach. This audio message helps the swimmer to find out the safe direction to swim.
The system costs around 25 thousand Euros to install and the audio buoys are being developed further to give reliable performance.
View a video clip from NTDTV: Audio Buoys Help for Blind Swimmers
Post in MarineBuzz on this day a year before:
Weekend Warning: Somali Pirates Hijack Four Ships in Forty Eight Hours
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