How A High-Tech Buoy Named Emily Could Save Migrants Off Greece

Boiteux, an assistant fire chief from Los Angeles, is helping train Greek first responders to use Emily. Boiteux, an assistant fire chief from Los Angeles, is helping train Greek first responders to use Emily. On a cold, rainy morning a few weeks ago, eight black inflatable rafts, loaded with migrants, bob in the waters off the northern shore of the Greek island of Lesbos. "This boat up there?" he says. So they ask for help from the coast guard." A Norwegian rescue boat with the European Union's border agency, Frontex, heads toward the distressed raft. Hantzopoulos walks along the rocky shore with John Sims, a fire captain from Sahuarita, Ariz. He's teaching members of the Hellenic Red Cross how to use a remote-controlled rescue device called Emily -- which stands for Emergency Integrated Lifesaving Lanyard. You might call Emily a buoy. You might call her a boat. She's about 4 feet long, weighs 25 pounds and looks like a cylinder wrapped in an orange-red life jacket. Sims steers Emily in the water with a remote control. She speeds toward the migrant rafts. "I'll keep her about 20-30 meters behind [them]," he says. The only thing that affects her sometimes over a wave is a little bit of wind. In a high wind situation we would actually fill the hull with some water to be able to weight her down some so, so, she wouldn't fly so bad off the top of the waves."