BOB

BOB, the AI companion and assistant for all first responders! Providing security for civilians and EMTs, BOB gives first responders the ability to act fast and with all the information they need!

Comment

Inspiration

Emergency response has always relied on incomplete information. First responders often arrive at chaotic scenes with little context, forced to assess danger and medical urgency in real time. What if the city itself could help? We were inspired by the idea of augmenting urban infrastructure with intelligent systems — blending wearable technology, edge devices, and AI analysis to create a safety layer that works before responders even arrive. BOB was born from that idea: a smart companion that bridges the gap between incident and intervention.

How We Built It

To bring BOB to life in just two days, we created a working prototype that simulates a smart city emergency pipeline.

Hardware

  • Raspberry Pi Zero
  • Logitech camera module
  • Laptop-hosted web server
  • Desktop machine acting as the “analyst”

Software Stack

  • Python + Flask backend
  • SQLite database for alert storage
  • JavaScript dashboard for responder triage
  • AI vision models for image analysis
  • Audio transcription processing
  • Blob storage for incident media archiving

System Flow

  1. Wake word “Bob Help” activates the Pi camera.
  2. Snapshots and audio recordings are captured.
  3. Media is transmitted to the analyst system.
  4. AI models assist in generating a threat rating.
  5. An alert is pushed to the responder dashboard.
  6. Responders triage, respond, and archive incidents.

What We Learned

Over the course of this project, we learned:

  • How to structure real-time data pipelines
  • How to store and retrieve media using SQLite BLOB storage
  • How to design a dashboard for triage-based workflows
  • How to manage backend state transitions (active → responding → archived)

Challenges We Faced

Time constraints. Designing hardware integration, AI analysis, backend logic, and a frontend dashboard in two days required constant iteration.

Media storage & handling. Efficiently packaging images and audio into zip files, storing them as blobs, and managing archival cleanup required careful backend logic.

Vision vs. Scope. Our biggest challenge was deciding what to build now versus what to describe as future potential.

Where This Could Go

While our demo focuses on a prototype pipeline, BOB could expand to:

  • City-wide IoT integration
  • Direct 911 system integration
  • Predictive emergency modeling
  • Real-time responder route optimization
  • Medical ID encryption & secure authorization systems

Built With

Share this project:

Updates