If you like to swim, you know that water is very unpredictable. A person is fine one moment and fighting to stay afloat the next. You might also know that it is one of the hardest things to get a person kicking and thrashing in the water to calm down and allow you to get him out physically.
That is why life preservers are for. But, if you had an option to throw a big life preserver towards the person or a compact device about the size of a pop can, which one would you choose? Majority of the people would prefer to go with the pop can. This is where OneUp comes in.
It measures 6.8 inches long and weighs only 363 grams. OneUp is a compact life preserver consisting of an inflatable polyurethane float with an attached CO2 canister. Both of these are stuffed inside a cylindrical case and remain so as long as everything is dry.
When coming in contact with water, a salt pod in OneUP dissolves and causes a spring to be released. This allows the canister to inflate the float and it pops out of its case. It might seem like a long process but the whole ordeal takes just 2 seconds.
Once the float is inflated, it can support swimmers weighing as much as 150 kg. The float can be deflated after use and a fresh canister and salt pod can be loaded in, allowing the whole thing to be reused. The project is currently an Indiegogo campaign and a pledge of $49 will get you a unit if they ever reach production.
You can see the OneUp in action in the video below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWKkuznpFFs