#HTE

Anti-COVID Design: A Gigantic Helmet That Reaches Your Shoulders

“Getting our economy moving again requires all of us to adapt to a new normal,” writes VYZR Technologies, a Canadian startup. The “new normal” they’re suggesting we adapt to is the BioVYZR, a gigantic helmet that encompasses your shoulders:

I only have, like, a million questions. What exactly is the use case here? Are you meant to wear these on crowded subway cars and buses? In an urban environment, do you really want your vision obscured from the sides? In suburban environments, you get out of your car and pull this out of the trunk? Where does it live when you’re not wearing it? When you get to the office, where/how do you store it? What is the cleaning process like? When you take it off, you must undoubtedly touch the outside of it, to pull it off like a helmet; aren’t you now touching the surface that was exposed to outside germs?

As far as the tech goes, a built-in battery-powered fan sucks in air through three N95 filters. Each filter must be replaced every 60 hours of use, the company says. They sell the replacement filters.

Amazingly, this was successfully crowdfunded in May, to the tune of nearly $300,000. The units are due to ship this month, so hopefully we’ll start seeing answers to the questions above.