U.S. Navy tests camera system that spots sailors overboard
Much of the hardware and software came from the commercial market. The video analytics software was developed by a private company for the cruise ship industry, and the Navy team used part of its research funding to license it, while the same company built the pedestals to a design drawn up in-house at Port Hueneme. The four thermal cameras were bought off the shelf. The Navy did not name the company.
The cruise industry has a regulatory reason to build such tools: the Cruise Vessel Safety and Security Act, passed by Congress in 2010, requires passenger cruise ships to integrate technology that can capture images of passengers or detect those who have fallen overboard, to the extent such technology is available.
Of course it is also reasonable to ask why so many U.S. Navy sailors appear to prefer the obliterating sea to keeping doing whatever they are doing but abstracted from that this is a safety technology all large ships should have. This is one of those "Wait how did we not already think of this and deploy it!" things to me.
See this article about automated detection of people falling off cruise ships.
https://www.thetravel.com/overboard-alarms-can-save-lives-why-dont-more-cruise-ships-have-them/
https://defence-blog.com/u-s-navy-tests-camera-system-that-spots-sailors-overboard/Open linkView original on lemmy.ca
10 replies
Now they can recover the sailors who would rather die than serve in the conditions on their ships.
Which Ray Bradbury short story is this again?
Kind of like when Foxconn put those nets around their tall buildings because the
slaveworkers kept jumping.I don’t like Foxconn necessarily, but the plants they started putting those nets in were basically cities with tens or hundreds of thousands of people. I don’t think you can put all the blame on the company since any group that large is going to have some suicidal people.
It’s the same in cities that build nets along the edges of bridges, or gates along train platforms. Doesn’t mean that the city is a hellscape, just reducing risks for suicidal ideation.
I wonder what the survival rate is for those who fall overboard large ships. I don't know exactly what I mean by "large" here, but something like the kind where the ship would take an hour just to turn around and go find you
Less than 25%
I imagine they have smaller boats they send out.
Right, or a helicopter or something. That was more to illustrate what I think a "large" ship is than what their actual rescue procedures are, but good point
The camera system will be connected to a series of speakers that alert following a detection, by broadcasting "Man overboard! Or it could be a woman!" -Maybe
So, the Navy's gearing up to release calendars of seamen like the OG firemen ones? Bold move.