In many parts of the world, shark attacks are a very real possibility for anyone entering the ocean. While suspended nets do help keep the toothsome fish separated from swimmers, they're far from from 100 percent reliable, plus sharks (along with other marine animals) regularly get caught in them and perish – as sharks are one of the ocean's apex predators, removing them from the ecosystem could have disastrous consequences. The Clever Buoy, however, may prove to be an effective method of keeping humans and sharks apart, with no harm coming to either.
Currently being developed by Australian tech firm Optus, the buoy is anchored to a seabed-located box, that emits sonar signals into the surrounding water. A processor in the buoy analyzes the reflections of those signals, and is able to identify the sonar signature of shark-sized objects in the vicinity. To lessen the chances of it being fooled by animals like dolphins, it also takes note of how such objects propel themselves through the water, to see if they're moving in a shark-like fashion.
The idea is that a series of the buoys/boxes could be arranged in a row offshore, running parallel to a beach. Whenever any of them detected a shark, it would send an alert via satellite to the local lifeguard's smartphone. That person would then sound an alarm, telling all swimmers to get out of the water until the shark had moved on.
Not only would the system be more humane than nets, but it would also presumably be easier to install and maintain. Additionally, unlike the existing buoy-based Shark Monitoring Network, it would detect all sharks instead of just those that had been previously caught and tagged.
The Clever Buoy technology has already successfully identified sharks in tests conducted at the Sydney Aquarium and Australia's Abrolhos Islands. Optus hopes to have the system commercialized by the middle of next year.
More information is available in the following video.
Source: Clever Buoy
