A 13-year-old from Kenya has outwitted the lions of Nairobi with an invention called “Lion Lights.”
Richard Turere, a humble but intelligent boy who likes to tinker on the family farm in Kitengela, south of the capital of Nairobi, has discovered that livestock-eating lions are driven away by flashing lights.
His simple, yet powerful, contraption is now protecting both the livestock and the lions who are sometimes shot for tracking and killing livestock near Nairobi National Park, which is not fenced in to the south.
Lions roam freely in the backdrop of the skyscrapers of Nairobi.
Turere’s system uses a few light bulbs hooked up to a switch, a transformer and an old car battery that is powered by a solar panel.
People have gone to all sorts of trouble to keep lions away from their herds, including erecting some elaborate barricades.
Light systems had been developed, but no one had come up with a flashing-light system, until Turere came along.
It was showcased excitedly last month in front of an intellectual gathering of big thinkers at a TED Conference in California.
He was only 11 when his rigged up the invention.
A leading Kenyan conservationist told the Star that his Lion Lights are spreading to other homesteads across the country.
“It seems really obvious, but nobody thought of this . . . nobody tried flashing lights,” Dr. Paula Kahumbu said in an interview from Nairobi.
She is an ecologist and executive director of Wildlife Direct, an organization dedicated to saving endangered wildlife.
She discovered the talents of Turere last year and initiated a talent search that led to his visit at a TED Conference in California late last month.
TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to “Ideas Worth Spreading.”
https://www.thestar.com/news/world/..._system_to_outsmart_lions_on_family_farm.html
Richard Turere, a humble but intelligent boy who likes to tinker on the family farm in Kitengela, south of the capital of Nairobi, has discovered that livestock-eating lions are driven away by flashing lights.
His simple, yet powerful, contraption is now protecting both the livestock and the lions who are sometimes shot for tracking and killing livestock near Nairobi National Park, which is not fenced in to the south.
Lions roam freely in the backdrop of the skyscrapers of Nairobi.
Turere’s system uses a few light bulbs hooked up to a switch, a transformer and an old car battery that is powered by a solar panel.
People have gone to all sorts of trouble to keep lions away from their herds, including erecting some elaborate barricades.
Light systems had been developed, but no one had come up with a flashing-light system, until Turere came along.
It was showcased excitedly last month in front of an intellectual gathering of big thinkers at a TED Conference in California.
He was only 11 when his rigged up the invention.
A leading Kenyan conservationist told the Star that his Lion Lights are spreading to other homesteads across the country.
“It seems really obvious, but nobody thought of this . . . nobody tried flashing lights,” Dr. Paula Kahumbu said in an interview from Nairobi.
She is an ecologist and executive director of Wildlife Direct, an organization dedicated to saving endangered wildlife.
She discovered the talents of Turere last year and initiated a talent search that led to his visit at a TED Conference in California late last month.
TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to “Ideas Worth Spreading.”
https://www.thestar.com/news/world/..._system_to_outsmart_lions_on_family_farm.html
