Computer in poolside rescue drama

Anything Pamela Anderson can do...

By Lucy Sherriff • Get more from this author

Posted in Bootnotes, 31st August 2005 15:11 GMT

A computer system has saved a ten-year-old girl from drowning in a swimming pool in Wales, by alerting lifeguards when she got into trouble.

The system, called Poseidon, costs around £65,000. It uses cameras both above and below the surface to monitor people in the pool. Alarms go off if someone is motionless at the bottom of the pool for more than 3 seconds.

It was this alarm that went off when the ten-year-old sank to the bottom of the pool's deep end. Lifeguards were alerted to exactly where the girl was, and were able to pull her out and resuscitate her. She was then taken to hospital where she has recovered.

Gwynedd County Council leisure officer Brian Evans told the BBC that the pool in question was particularly difficult to lifeguard: "[It] is a typical 1960s pool, with a lot of windows that create a glare. The deep end is 12ft 6in, that's unusual these days, because of the diving area.

"This is the first time we've had to use it [Poseidon] in the two years it has been installed. Everything worked according to plan." ®

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