A Bright Idea for Onboard Safety

The U.S. Coast Guard requires boats to have certain things on board for safety, such as personal flotation devices and flares. When a navigation/anchor light is required, it must be mounted at the vessel’s highest point. There’s a good reason for this: The higher the light is above the waterline, the farther away it can be seen by other boats, enhancing everyone’s safety out on the waterways.

However, that high point on the vessel is also prime real estate when it comes to some of today’s AI technology. There are now cameras with AI features that can augment situational awareness and safety to provide skippers at the helm with bird’s-eye views all around the yacht. These cameras can identify and track buoys, debris, logs, other vessels and marine wildlife, and their detection range increases with mounting height, making them most effective when they’re installed at the vessel’s highest point.

Hence the new partnership between Lookout, which makes marine AI systems, and Lumitec, which makes marine lighting. The companies have combined advanced AI vision cameras with a Coast Guard-certified all-around white navigation/anchor light, eliminating the challenge of trying to install both items in the same spot on board.

“Our integrated system offers boat owners significant advantages by combining navigation compliance with advanced safety technology,” David Rose, CEO of Lookout, stated in a press release. “The high-mounted night vision camera provides exceptional range and clarity in darkness, while the 360-degree camera delivers complete situational awareness around your vessel. It’s essentially a second set of eyes on the water that never blinks, never gets distracted and can see things the human eye might miss. The system is available in various colors to complement different vessel designs while providing the safety benefits that modern boating demands.”

The integrated system is compatible with different styles of boats from about 20 to 65 feet length overall, according to the Lookout team, which premiered the product at the Palm Beach International Boat Show in March.

Who created Lookout? The team has included AI researchers, video game developers, 3D designers and hardware engineers. Lookout systems generally combine data from computer vision, charts, AIS and online sources into a single, 3D augmented reality view that can display on multifunction screens from leading brands such as Garmin, Furuno, Raymarine and Simrad, as well as on tablets and smartphones.

Take the next step: click over to getalookout.com

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