The Rescue Buoy robotic lifeguard

Jens Andersson of Sweden (no, not that Jens of Sweden) won the BraunPrize for Technical Design for his water based Rescue Buoy concept. The robot would monitor waterways used for recreation and then rescue a person drowning under the "direction of the lifeguard." A team of robotic lifeguards could monitor an entire beach. Jens doesn't give any details to how all this might work, but hey, this is design…not engineering! The Jury liked the idea because as we know, typically the sole mission of any robot is the destruction of the human race — "lifesaving robots are still rather unusual" they concede.