System and method for identifying when a water-sports participant has fallen

A boat comprising:

• a stern;
• an image sensor positioned on the boat to have a field of view of an environment aft of the stern of the boat, the image sensor configured to capture at least one image of the environment aft of the stern of the boat, the environment captured in the at least one image including a water surface aft of the boat;
• and
• an image processor communicatively coupled to the image sensor, the image processor configured to:
• receive the at least one image from the image sensor;
• define an analysis region in an image to be analyzed, the image to be analyzed including the at least one image captured by the image sensor, the analysis region being only a portion of the image to be analyzed;
• identify, using an object recognition process executed by the image processor, whether or not an object indicative of a water-sports participant is present in the analysis region;
• and
• determine that the water-sports participant has fallen when the object indicative of the water-sports participant is not present in the analysis region.

A boat comprising:

• a stern;
• an image sensor positioned on the boat to have a field of view of an environment aft of the stern of the boat, the image sensor configured to capture at least one image of the environment aft of the stern of the boat, the environment captured in the at least one image including a water surface aft of the boat;
• and
• an image processor communicatively coupled to the image sensor, the image processor configured to:
• receive the at least one image from the image sensor;
• identify, using an object recognition process executed by the image processor, a person in an image to be analyzed, the image to be analyzed including the at least one image captured by the image sensor;
• identify, using the object recognition process executed by the image processor, a piece of water-sports equipment in the image to be analyzed;
• calculate a distance between the person and the piece of water-sports equipment in the image to be analyzed;
• and
• determine that a water-sports participant has fallen when the calculated distance between the person and the piece of water-sports equipment is greater than a threshold distance.