SYDNEY (AUSTRALIA)- Australian tech company Optus is developing a new technology that can detect sharks and send alerts to lifeguards via smartphones.
The Clever Buoy is a floating device anchored to a seabed-located box, that emits sonar signals into the surrounding water. A processor in the buoy analyses the reflections of those signals, and is able to identify the sonar signature of shark-sized objects in the vicinity.
It also takes note of how such objects propel themselves through the water, to see if they are moving in a shark-like fashion. A series of the buoys/boxes could be arranged in a row offshore, running parallel to a beach.
Whenever any of them detects a shark, it would send an alert via satellite to the local lifeguard’s smartphone.
The lifeguard would then sound an alarm, telling all swimmers to get out of the water until the shark had moved on.
The Clever Buoy technology has been tested successfully at the Sydney Aquarium and Australia’s Abrolhos Islands.