One of the most dangerous things a child can do (apart from being driven in a car) is go swimming in a pool.
Today’s invention is a large mat, made of tough, just-negatively buoyant, foam which covers the floor area of a deep swimming pool and which is supported by columns of the same material bonded onto the mat’s underside. The columns hold the mat off the pool floor and allow enough water depth above the mat’s surface for everyone to swim and to support their (reduced) weight when standing on it.
The reduced effective dept of the pool makes it much harder for a child to be overlooked if it’s lying on the mat’s surface (which could be made in a colour such as fluorescent green, to contrast sharply with all human skin tones).
Also, anyone recklessly diving in would avoid neck and back injuries due to being cushioned by the compressible columns collapsing beneath the foam surface.
