Professional Rescue

Merry Christmas to everyone.

Last Saturday another step in our project of “Multi-Layer Search and Rescue” primarily from small rescue craft on relatively shallow waters. Aim: to progress water SAR capabilities through accessible technology to rescue within the short time frame utilizing a multi-faceted approach when searching for missing persons in marine or inland waters.
To remind, in very short, the “layers” are: conventional water SAR tools of hydrology/marine knowledge and human deductive reasoning from intelligence/data gathered; ‘Wessex Rescue’s’ co-project with ‘Dorset Search Dogs’ to develop K9 SAR on boats; Roto-Tech Kontra 450 Boat from Specialist Small Craft www.specialistsmallcraft.co.uk a stable robust rescue craft platform for safety and K9 SAR; a drone with RGB & Thermography (TIC) capability & the nvuk.co.uk thermal spotter; hand-held sonar with artificial intelligence (AI) from an Aquaeye; a ROV - its last appearance was a Chasin M2 Pro Max ROV with 4K camera & sonar & recovery claw all to find an anchored Ruth Lee ltd https://www.linkedin.com/company/ruth-lee-ltd/posts/?feedView=all manikin.
Steve Rains from AlphaGeo aided by my colleagues from ‘Wessex Rescue’, came with a specific focus this time, to use the M2ProMax ROV equipped with a (different) sonar – the Blueprint Subsea M1200d multibeam sonar. In very turbid tidal waters & poor visibility, concluded video useable only for very close quarters - sonar came to the fore as the search option – to yet again “search for Ruth”.
The steps taken after ROV launched – distances gauged from the sonar on-screen display to “home in”:
 Conduct “search” and at about 5m first detection of the Ruth Lee Ltd manikin using sonar
 upon closing the distance to 3m, “Ruths” outline became clearer
 fighting the flow, at about 1.5m ROV is switched to the onboard video camera for visual control to deploy recovery claw onto manikin
By the sonar extending the search detection range over the camera then allowed through the video camera an improved recovery efficiency with the claw in that narrow search time frame. Clearly demonstrated how ROV sonar and video camera capabilities complement each other in testing conditions for search and rescue operations. After instruction Wessex Rescue colleagues repeated the tasks with great success.
Huge thanks to Steve of AlphaGeo Ltd (https://alphageouk.com/); Wessex Rescue boat rescue Technicians, Mark of Specialist Small Craft for a great day of research and knowledge sharing.
Mark Pullinger, Adrian Fowler, https://www.facebook.com/WessexRescue,