Rescue the boy from the borewell - better way?

[The_Big_K]

CEans,

I felt really bad when I saw the news on Television. A six year boy fell into a 180 feet deep borewell. It has been more than 36 hours now and the rescue operation is still in progress.

Read news online: http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv...WEN20070017818

I was wondering if there are better ways to take the kid out of the borewell. Simple idea, in my opinion, would be to let a thin guy go inside the borewell upside down ( like the way they do in bungee jumping ) slowly. I think it would not have taken much efforts.

What do you think?

-The Big K-

[djnachi]

Hi Biggy,

Yes very sad to know that. But I think we should seriously do something as such kinda situations are quite frequently happening. Remember the Prince scene at some village in Chandigarh which was followed by few other similar accidents which involved human loss.
The Government should take some effective measures real soon. The media can only highlight such incidents just to get their TRP ratings nothing else.

Biggy do you think we through our forum can help bringing awareness among the rurals where such incidents occur most. After all, just being good Engineers and discussing our own good isn't what we actually are. Its all waste if we can't help our own people. So I think CE should pick up such social awareness campaings atleast at the regional level.
Know its easy to say but preity hard to apply but still we can atleast give it a try, what say??

Regards,
Nachi.

[crook]

The same thought had crossed my mind. I think the diameter of the borewell is too small for a person to enter. But I liked the idea.

DJ Nachi's idea is good as well. We, as a community of engineers, can certainly make a difference to the society. I'm game for it.

[ash]

BigK, It would be awfully uncomfortable for the thin guy to be suspended upside down the whole time, since blood would rush down to his head.

And I also agree about providing assistance to the regional level. Thats what the Institution of Engineers Malaysia (graduates and students section) does at times.. having projects at charity and orphanages, like fixing water supply, roofs.. etc.

But as CEans, we'd have to wait until Crazy Engineers is fully established, with many members participating Im guessing theres many members from India, so thats the first place we can start eh?

[The_Big_K]

Yeh, I didn't think about that. But I seriously believe that the job could have been done in a better way and in shorter time. The kid's life could have been saved.

I'm really glad to know about IEM . I agree that once CE is established, we'll work on something similar. Although a big part of CEan gang comes from India, we've been getting lot of members from Malaysia, Singapore, Australia & Europe. You can already see that we are growing rapidly, that too, without much of advertising.

I'm glad that we have like minded people over here! Way to go guys!

-The Big K-

[rosh009]

okey biggie! glad to know that CE is ESTABLISHING WORLDWIDE!
now back to the topic , good to see you appealing to CEans to come out with a solution for this borewell menace which seems to be repeating every fortnight or so.
as ash said it will be indeed difficult for the guy upside down to go into that depth and comeback.
instead of sending a guy all the way down why not use some simple robotic arm ie. send a hydraulic powered arm with automated robotic hands deep down into the pit . if the boy is still conscious [chances are more considering the automation of the hydraulics ] ask him to hang onto the robotic handswhich can be include a belt kinda thing . suppose the boy is unconscious , then by automation belt the boy and lift hi out of the pit.
and we can have full-faith in the automation of robotic hand when boy is unconscious because in today's generation doctors perform the most sensitive operations using robotics technology , hence,the chances of successful operation in case of borewell rescue are very high!

its just a basic idea that i have given here. the in-depth , more technical details may be discussed in forth-coming posts. i hope the robotic geeks calling for ideas out here in CE , may take notice of this idea and start posting their technical views for this idea.

[The_Big_K]

Rosh, we'll do lots of good things, we just need to grow & turn the right screws !

Althought I like Rosh's idea, I think was not very practical. The accident happened at a remote place where they couldn't have robots.

Keep flooding all your ideas!

-The Big K-

[ash]

A borewell has a diameter between 6 to 12 inches, which I guess limits area in which you can work with once you somehow reach the boy. In an ideal situation, Rosh's idea is good, but in reality it will be difficult to "automatically" belt the boy if he is tightly fitted at the bottom (assuming he is unconscious). You'd probably have to "clamp" him from the top somehow.

Plus, Big K said a remote area like that wont be readily stocked with that kinda robot. But seeing how the boy can survive more than 24 hours, maybe you can fly one from somewhere?