Jesus, looking at this and reading a few of the comments has me well scared of the dangers of water again. Good reminder, but always chilling.
Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
41–50 of 424 posts
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#42Rates of drowning in Europe[0][1] vary by more than an order of magnitude. I'd be curious about compulsory swimming lessons in schools, as is done here in Switzerland[2], and its correlation to the rate of drowning.
[0] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/D...
[1] http://78.136.22.110/europe/info/switzerland/switzerland-dro...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swimming_lessons#Switzerland
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#43One of the important lessons I learnt from a lifeguard is that movies depict a very inaccurate representation of drowning. The movies would have you believe that drowning is a violent and noisy event when in reality it is an inconspicuous and silent event. The victim cannot shout or call for help when they are struggling to keep their nose above the water level. Another important lesson I learnt that sometimes when s…
Is there still water in their lungs? Why doesn't it get coughed out once they are out of the water?
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#44This is brilliant and one of those things that should be in all schools etc as it is an education in observation awareness that holds well in many walks of life.
I speak as somebody who trained to be a lifeguard in the UK - taking the bronze medallion #1 and whilst in intensive and in depth (having to know the four chambers of the heart as well as full CPR...) course with lots of practical exam parts, awareness that this gives you is something you can not learn from books and is hard to roleplay.
#1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronze_Medallion_(United_Kingd...
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#45Rates of drowning in Europe[0][1] vary by more than an order of magnitude. I'd be curious about compulsory swimming lessons in schools, as is done here in Switzerland[2], and its correlation to the rate of drowning. [0] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/D... [1] http://78.136.22.110/europe/info/switzerland/switzerland-dro... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swimming_lessons#Switzerland
Netherlands reporting in: swimming lessons are spread over three competency group, and as far as I know, nearly all primary schools take time in the curriculum to do at least the first two competency levels before the pupils turn 7 or 8.
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#46All in all after watching several of their videos I feel like I do a good job of recognizing the drowning person, but I’m amazed at how quickly the lifeguards spot it and dive into action. Even knowing that in this short clip there is absolutely someone drowning I still have doubt, but the lifeguard who doesn’t have that context is already half way to the person by the time I’m sure.
Of course the lifeguard has extra context by just being in the same space with these people beforehand. They're probably already watching certain people more closely before the video starts while you and I enter the space cold (and through a fixed window).
I wonder how people would feel about machine-learning enhanced lifeguard system. Machines are sharp all the time.
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#47Rates of drowning in Europe[0][1] vary by more than an order of magnitude. I'd be curious about compulsory swimming lessons in schools, as is done here in Switzerland[2], and its correlation to the rate of drowning. [0] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/D... [1] http://78.136.22.110/europe/info/switzerland/switzerland-dro... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swimming_lessons#Switzerland
Netherlands reporting in: swimming lessons are spread over three competency group, and as far as I know, nearly all primary schools take time in the curriculum to do at least the first two competency levels before the pupils turn 7 or 8.
Thanks for your answer. I posted my question to the open data stack exchange site[0]. If there isn't an existing dataset, maybe we can create one country by country.
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#48While there are many machine learning-based drowning detection systems out there, I'm having a hard time finding solid information comparing their reaction time and accuracy rates to lifeguards. Does anyone have any solid research that they've found?
I don't want to replace lifeguards or increase their workload by spreading them thinner, but want to find out if we complement them together whether or not it would increase detection rates and lives saved. However, if the current state of the art performs abysmally compared to lifeguards, then I have doubt whether or not they can be combined for improved outcomes.
[1] https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=machine...
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#49It seems like spotting drowning children could be a good use case for computer vision, at least as a backup. The heuristics for a drowning child are pretty marked, but they're hard to spot for humans distracted by lots of other stimuli.
Looks like this has already been done:
https://swimeye.com/
Re: Spot the Drowning Child (2015)
#50All in all after watching several of their videos I feel like I do a good job of recognizing the drowning person, but I’m amazed at how quickly the lifeguards spot it and dive into action. Even knowing that in this short clip there is absolutely someone drowning I still have doubt, but the lifeguard who doesn’t have that context is already half way to the person by the time I’m sure.
The guards actually have a lot more context. They have been watching the people in the pool and have mentally sorted them by how much attention they need. They have also been staring at the same pool for hours and their brain is ignoring all the visual noise that is distracting you. They also have the benefit of stereo vision and sound.
You're spot on, the visual risk assessment aspect plays a big part as does the whole environment filtering aspect.
Also helps that in this instance, most have rubber rings and if you see an empty rubber ring, that in itself would trigger concerns and focus.