In the video, two flat black bags resembling large hot-water bottles expand slowly, gradually lifting a collapsed concrete-and-rebar wall and creating a space between the wall and a mound of rocks beneath. The film shows a test of a design by Eyad Janneh and his team at nonprofit Field Ready that is now being deployed in Syria, where it is used to lift heavy debris during searches for civilians following bomb attacks.

Janneh was raised in Syria but left in 2010 and now works in Istanbul. His team designs and tests tools that can be made locally from available materials. The airbags, for example, are made from a polyester fabric with a rubber sheet cover and some binding accessories—repurposing materials already being used as covers for cargo trucks. In April one of these airbags was used in Syria to help rescue two people trapped in rubble.

—Nanette Byrnes